


Fallen Soldier

by ShabbyChicGeek3



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Angst, Death, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Romance, Suspense
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-10-28
Updated: 2015-04-29
Packaged: 2018-02-23 00:08:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 26
Words: 49,640
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2526725
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShabbyChicGeek3/pseuds/ShabbyChicGeek3
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A story originally posted on the FanFiction site, that got reasonably popular. Based on a shot from when the Winter Soldier trailer first came out. After Captain America and Black Widow finish a mission, a mistake ensures a serious injury in Natasha. Can Cap save her? And if not, how can he tell Clint? Please check it out...... Pretty please.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. One

It had all happened so fast. One minute they were standing there, they thought the fight was over. That they had won. Natasha wiped a splattering of blood from her face, she was obviously out of breath. They had fought hard against the Winter Soldier, they had defeated him.

"Are we done?" Natasha asked cautiously, her body still tense in the aftermath of the fight. Steve looked at the bodies around him,the wreckage, the corpse of Bucky. The person who had once been his friend.

"I think so. We did it." Steve smiled at her cautiously, she didn't smile back. Natasha wasn't the smiling type. "Good job Captain, I guess we're done here." She turned, began walking out of the room, Steve followed. He had to fight the urge to turn around and look back at Bucky's body one last time. Part of him wanted to, but he couldn't. It was time to let go, move on. His friend had been gone for a long time, all Steve could do now was bury what was left of him. Natasha picked up an empty gun she had left by the door, as she was tucking it into her holster she paused. Instead of moving on, she just stood there, coiled like a tightly wound spring. Waiting for something. Sensing something.

"What's wrong?" Steve asked, hand tightening instinctively back around his shield. Black Widow's head was cocked to one side, her eyes systemetically scanning the room "I don't know," she muttered. "Do you hear that?" As she asked this, Cap suddenly became aware of a very quiet sound. A quiet beeping. "Wait, I do hear something. What do you think it-" Looking now for the sound of the noise, Steve felt his insides churn when he saw Bucky. Saw Bucky sitting up. Saw him alive, and sneering. Saw him about to press down on a trigger- No, wait, that was a detonator.

The world exploded, everything was heat and noise and the rush of uncontrollable movement. Steve was sent flying across the room, there was nothing but the feeling of being utterly out of control, sheer terror, and inexplicably a fleeting memory of Peggy. Then Steve slammed into a wall. And then there was nothing but darkness.

When Steve woke up, everything was foggy, and he was covered in dust. He felt a stinging pain in his arm, he glanced at it and flicked off a clump of something that was burning him. Cap checked himself over, and found no obvious injuries other than the dull throbbing at the base of his skull. Nothing life threatening, good. He stood up, and looked around. It was complete carnage. Any men that they might have left alive i the course of the fight, were without a doubt dead now. Or else wishing they were. Many were crushed by pieces of the ceiling, half a dozen were ablaze. Since they were not moving, Steve could only hope those men were dead. He couldn't remember everything…. Just give it a minute.. He forced himself to stand, for a second the room spun dizzily around him. His eyes focused blearily on things, the wall, a gun, a bloody mass. It didn't look human, but with a jolt of clarity, Steve realized it was what was left of Bucky. Then, all bleariness was zapped from his body when he remembered Natasha.

"Natasha!" He called out, she was probably fine. She had to be fine. "Natasha! Where are you?!" He tried to run towards where they had been when the bomb went off, almost fell to his knees. He didn't have time for this, he couldn't be weak when one of his team needed him. He stood, and moved as quickly as he could, forcing the dull throbbing out of his head. He needed to focus. She needed him to focus. He began searching for her, lifting rubble, tossing aside anything in his way, his stomach twisted every time he found the bodies of one of their enemies. What if she was dead too? She couldn't be, she was the Black Widow. He began looking faster when he began thinking. What if she was bleeding to death? Or a wall had trapped her with little oxygen? What if right now, Hydra was coming for them? He didn't have time for this. He moved faster.

He thought it was more blood at first, something already splattered liberally all around the room. It wasn't quite the right color though, spilling out from under a fallen wall. He looked twice at it, his heart stopped as he recognized it as red hair.

"Oh gosh, Natasha! Can you hear me?!" He dove for the wreckage, started pulling away pieces of it, tried to get her to talk to him. Or prove she was alive. Finally he had the upper half of her body uncovered, to his relief she was still breathing. A gash on her neck was close to her jugular, and her arm was bent at an unnatural angle. But she was alive. She was breathing.

"Natasha, come on. Come on, you have to wake up. We need to get out of here!" Steve lightly shook her by the shoulders, he wasn't thinking. Too stressed to think that shaking someone with an unknown injury wasn't the best idea. He just was thinking how if she woke up he could better find out her injuries, and decide how best to transport her. He didn't know what to do, he was a soldier not a doctor. Steve had had a few first aid classes during the war, but that had been too many years ago, too many. He hardly remembered anything from them that was not already obvious. His head was pounding to the rapid beat of his heart, if they didn't get out soon Hydra could come. They could both die, neither of them were in good shape to do more fighting today. He had to move her, but it would be so much easier if he knew what her injuries were first.

"Natasha Romanoff! Wake up!" He was almost shouting at her, it worked. Her eyes fluttered open, they didn't quite focus on him. They darted around the room, a beat too slow to be fine. "Natasha!" Steve spoke in her face, she wasn't focusing on anything. It was like she didn't see him, even though he was right in front of her. Natasha's hand moved slowly to her side, her fingers clutched at the empty gun holster.

"Natasha, we have to get out of here, I need you to tell me where you hurt, so that I can help you. Where are you injured? Come on, we have to get out. Help me out!" Natasha's eyes focused on something behind him for a second, and she spoke. "Clint..." Before unconsciousness pulled her back under.

Suddenly. feeling extremely stupid, Steve remembered his ear piece. He'd turned it off a few hours before, choosing to allow Natasha to communicate with Shield, seeing as she was more helpful to them anyway. Instantly Maria Hill was yelling in his ear. "Steve! What the hell?! What happened? Natasha was communicating with us, but about an hour ago we heard an explosion and her comm went blank. What is going on? We need information, now." Steve cursed to himself. He still didn't know how badly Natasha was injured, and she had already been here for at least an hour without medical care. This wasn't good. He hastily explained the situation to Maria.

"We thought the target was dead, he deployed some kind of, explosion I guess. I was unconscious until a half hour ago, Agent Romanoff is down. She's trapped under some debris, I'm trying to get her out." Maria was silent for a half a second longer than she usually would be. "Captain, please confirm what you just said. Agent Romanoff is down?" Steve was back to pulling debris off of Natasha, and not in the mood for repetitive questions.

"Yes, Agent Romanoff is down. Requesting a medical jet immediately. As soon as possible." At Maria's request Cap explained what he could see of Natasha's injuries, and gave his coordinates so they could be picked up here rather than at the original meeting point.

Fifteen minutes later, the jet still wasn't here. And he had just found a reason for why Natasha wouldn't wake up. He pulled off the last large chunk of rubble, as he did a low moan escaped her lips. Natasha's eyes rolled frantically under their closed lids, she was clearly in pain. And he instantly saw why.

Her light leg was twisted at an unnatural angle, making her broken arm look almost normal and a pool of blood was collecting under her. But worse, a quick examination showed that she almost definitely had a spinal break. Maria's voice was in Steve's ear again.

"Captain, we can't land the jet exactly at your destination. You will have to meet us, we can land roughly four miles away. But if you don't go fast, you will have to meet us more like thirty miles away. So go fast." Steve grimaced, he probed at Natasha's side where he realized more blood was oozing out. "Agent Romanoff's condition is worse than initially thought, I'm not sure she should be moved at all without medical care.

Steve heard Maria curse over the comm. "We can't land there Captain, it's too risky, and could blow the whole operation. Just be careful with her, we will be waiting for you." As Maria gave directions on where to meet, Steve hastily attempted to administer his clumsy first aid. He tore clothing from the corpses of a few soldiers, and haphazardly bandaged the wounds. Once he had done what he could, he picked Natasha up in his arms. Maria was in his ear again.

"Captain, the jets ready. All you have to do is get there. You have half an hour." Hearing this, Steve wiped more blood from the Black Widows face, and readjusted his grip on her. Her vibrant hair spilled over his arm, blood started flowing freely from her wounds. To Steve's alarm, his arms under her back soon became drenched in the crimson liquid. Natasha let out a whimpering wail he never thought he would hear come from her. Steve began walking and then jogging in the direction of help.

"Come on, Natasha. We have to get to the jet, they'll fix you and you will be fine. I am so sorry, I know this hurts." Steve tried to be gentle, but every time he had to readjust his grip on her, or if his steps faltered, she made another sound of pain. Every sound she made physically hurt him too. He felt he had let down his fellow soldier, he had failed her. He had failed his team. He had failed- Oh no. Oh god, what was Clint going to do to him?"

As if hearing his thoughts, Natasha suddenly gasped, "Clint... Hawkeye..." Another little twist of pain stabbed through Steve. He had privately always thought Natasha was the strongest of the group. Everyone else had their powers, Tony had a suit. Thor was practically a God. Banner could become a giant green monster who could single handily take on an alien army, and him? Well, he was a genetically altered soldier.

But Natasha had none of this. Nothing at all. She had her training, and her gun, but she still took more risks than any of her teammates. He had never seen her falter, never seen fear in her eyes. On one mission she had a knife buried in her arm, several bullet wounds, and what they later found was a cracked rib. She had continued fighting without even complaining, they didn't even know she was hurt until they were finished.

But now, she looked so fragile. So wounded. Was she supposed to be this pale? How much blood can a person lose? Oh god if she died he would never forgive himself. He was half a mile from the jet now, and Natasha was fading fast. Her hair looked even redder than usual against her stark white skin.

Steve turned on his ear piece again. "Maria, I am almost to the jet but Agent Romanoff needs medical assistance as soon as possible. Please make sure that a med team will be waiting upon arrival." Maria sounded grim when she replied. "We have an entire wing of the jet prepared. We are all ready for you."

This was good to hear, but even better was the fact that after a few more minutes Steve could see the field where presumably the aircraft was hovering. When he got close enough the invisibility shield came down and the jet landed. The second they got onboard, a team of medical personnel whisked Natasha from Steve's arms, he watched as she was wheeled away in a gurney. He was almost alone now, a doctor was ordering Steve to follow him to be checked over, but all Steve could see was Maria Hill staring at him at the end of the hall. He felt he owed her an apology. He knew he did.

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. It all happened so fast, I don't know what else I could do." Steve blinked hard, his eyes burning, the words fell out of him. Maria looked more stunned than angry as she spoke. "No, it's, it's not you're fault. I know if you could you would have done everything you could. And you already did everything that you could. It's just... I've seen Romanoff go through a lot, but this time is different. I just haven't seen her injured like this in a while." Maria shrugged, trying to appear normal before she continued.

"She's tough though. I'm sure she will be fine. She's been through a lot worse than a bombing before. A lot worse. She'll be fine before you can blink. She's a fast healer." Maria started to walk briskly away, the doctor probed at a burn on Steve's arm. It sounded to Steve as if Maria was trying a bit too hard too convince herself Natasha would be fine.

"Maria!" Steve called after her before she turned a corner. She stopped, and turned. "Is anyone else onboard? Any of the Avengers?" They both knew what he was asking. Is Clint Barton onboard. Maria shook her head, pursing her lips. "No. But if you want I'll find their locations." Steve nodded, and worry turned his gut over. Maria started walking, he called her again.

"Maria!" Again, she turned around to him. "Captain? What?" He hesitated. Saying this would admit his worst fears, add realism to this nightmare. But he had to do this. He had to acknowledge his terror and act accordingly on it. If Natasha were to, to die, they would never forgive him. But if she died and he could do this one small thing to help, he should. He saw Maria's eyes burning. With anger? With fear? He opened his mouth.

"Maria, find Clint."


	2. Chapter Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Please review guys.....

"Captain, your good to go. Just watch the burns for the next few days, and if your head wound starts bleeding again, you need to come back here so we can keep an eye on it." The doctor had just finished taking care of Steve, who luckily wasn't badly hurt. The worst wound was a gash at the base of his skull, a few stitches fixed that up though. Steve was so consumed with fear and guilt he had hardly felt the pain.

"Now Captain, I strongly recommend that you remain here for the night so we can keep an eye on you, make sure you are ok to go. It is necessary and if-" Steve hopped off the examination table, pulled on the shirt the had been given to him after he showered and changed out of his uniform. "Doc, thanks for the concern, but I really don't have time to be monitored right now. I promise if i feel worse, or if anything starts bleeding or killing me I will come back and let you check me over. But now, if you don't mind I have a team member I need to check on. I hope you don't mind." Steve smiled politely at the Dr., who looked extremely unhappy, and left the room before he could be lectured. Or worse, directly ordered to stay for observation.

Walking, Steve realized he had no idea where Natasha was right now. He had been on edge since he and Natasha had been separated, trying not to think of all the things that could be happening to her when he was stuck having mundane injuries examined and taken care of. Was she in surgery yet? Had she been diagnosed throughly, did they know all of her injuries? Had she woken up, said anything? What if she did and there was no one there for her to see? No friendly face to help her? What if she had spoken and no friend was there to hear it? What if she called for Clint, what if Maria hadn't found him yet, what if Natasha was de- No! He had to stop thinking like that. She had to be fine, or else Hill would have come to get him. She would do that, right?

Steve blinked hard, refocusing himself. He saw red when he blinked too hard. Looked down at his hands, imagined they were still drenched in her blood. He had taken a fast shower, scrubbed at his hands and arms fiercely, but felt he could never get that blood off. Never. If she died, everyone would look at him, and see her blood staining him for the rest of his life. He shook his head, and began scanning the faces around him, looking for someone from whom he could learn the whereabouts of Natasha. He hoped to find someone he at least recognized, he hit the jackpot when he saw her striding swiftly towards his direction.

"Agent Hill!" Steve called out, the hall was crowded, so when Maria didn't respond Steve thought maybe she didn't hear him. He walked closer to her, maneuvering through the crowd of people before he called out again. "Agent Hill! Agent Hill!" Still she ignored him. Was she suddenly deaf? Dread sparked within Steve as he realized, maybe she was avoiding him. Maybe she had something she didn't want to tell him. Cap moved and found himself in front of Maria.

She was walking briskly, and when Steve so suddenly appeared in her path she almost fell over him. She looked into his eyes, and Steve couldn't help but gasp. Maria was as white as paper, her usually neat hair was falling into her face rather than styled around it. And her eyes, they looked both sorrowful and dead at the same time. She didn't say anything, just looked at him. Steve saw she was upset, realized maybe she hadn't been avoiding him, but everyone. She wasn't the kind of person who liked to show what she was feeling. And right now, anyone could read the dread and heartache on her face. Steve paused trying to tactfully phrase his question.

"Natasha... Is she...?" He asked, dreading the answer. Maria shook her head. "No, no. She's alive. It's just, it's not looking too good captain." She took a shuddering breathe before she continued. "I'll let a Doctor tell you all the details, but they think something's wrong with her spine, she has some internal bleeding." Maria glanced around, and seeing the many employees in the hall (many dawdling trying to listen in on the conversation) shook her head, and met Steve's eyes.

"Captain, please follow me." Steve really just wanted to see Natasha, ask a doctor to explain to him everything that was wrong with her. He wanted to be by her if, no. When she woke up. She should be able to see a face she knew once she awoke. He should be there now. But Agent Hill was his superior, he had to follow her. Besides she might have something important to tell him.

Maria led Steve into an empty room, containing nothing but a sterile hospital bed and some medical equipment. She closed the door, and turned towards him. "Captain, I can't get ahold of Agent Barton, I can't find him. He is on a mission somewhere in Asia, so it's possible he is not somewhere that has an internet or phone connection. But if something is wrong with him, if he is injured or has been kidnapped, if we can't get ahold of him!" Maria's shoulders crumpled and she began pacing around the small room. And Steve knew. She didn't think Natasha would make it. She felt responsible for Clint getting to say goodbye to his partner, in the same way as Steve did. He felt this way because it was his stupid fault that Natasha was injured in the first place, he wasn't sure why Maria felt responsible. But anyone could see the heavy load of guilt weighing her down.

Steve had never seen Maria like this, it was as if he was seeing her for the first time when she wasn't hiding behind her walls. What a pity it took fear (and maybe grief) to expose what a person is really like. He got up, and wasn't sure what to do. He had little experience with women as it was, but he could probably attempt to comfort a normal one. But Maria was not normal, she was one of the most self disciplined and maybe most terrifying people he had ever known. She never faltered, never stumbled.  
She always helped the Avengers, but never got close to them (with the exception of Clint and Natasha). She was a complete mystery to Steve, what could he do to help her?

Adding to his alarm, he thought he saw a tear steal down her face. Just for a second. But he must have imagined it, this was the last person in the world he thought he would ever see cry. Yet when she spoke, Maria's voice did sound unusually husky.

"Captain, we have to find Agent Barton. We have to. Because-" Maria cut herself off and closed her eyes. Steve moved closer to her and cautiously placed a hand on her arm, feeling like a complete idiot. Maria flinched, but didn't say anything. Just stopped moving.

"Hey, it's going to be fine. Can't you guys track him? I am sure as soon as he can Clint will contact you guys!" Actually Steve wasn't sure about that, but it didn't hurt to be positive. "When was he due to return anyway? He'll probably be back at headquarters soon!" Maria's lips tightened at this, her eyes narrowing thinly. Her arm jerked nervously under his hand, like she wanted to yank it away. But she didn't. Steve felt like and idiot, wished he hadn't said anything. What did he know about how long Barton's missions usually lasted, or when he'd return? Stupid.

"Captain, this is confidential information. Agent Barton was sent on a two week long mission a few days ago, he was supposed to check in with us last night before starting surveillance on his target. He never contacted us though. It may be that he was unable to make contact because it would risk blowing his cover, but we don't think that's the case. He could have been injured, but it is most likely he was apprehended." Maria swallowed and finally moved her arm away from under Steve's hand.

"If we can't find Agent Barton soon, I don't know if he will ever be able to see Natasha again." Hearing these words, Steve couldn't hold back a gasp of horror. "Mari- Agent Hill, just tell me. Be honest! How badly injured is she?"

Maria didn't meet his eyes. "The Doctor said that they will attempt operating once her condition has stabilized, but they think recovery is unlikely. It's essential we find Barton soon. If you'll excuse me Captain, I have to go back to my work."

Before Steve's eyes, it was like all of Maria's walls rose up around her again. Emotion was gone, her eyes were neutral and sedate. She swiftly pushed her hair out of her face, then she was just gone. Steve was alone. He wanted to process what had just happened, it wasn't like Hill had shown happiness or even admitted to being scared. Yet he had just witnessed more emotion in the agent than he ever thought he would. But he didn't have time to think about that. He had to get to Natasha.  
-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Did you review yet? Still reading?

Steve soon found his way to Ward 3, but instantly found his path blocked. A smug looking man in a doctors coat stood in front of a door with the number three on it, his arms were crossed, he was absorbed in his own self importance. And he wouldn't let Steve in.

"Captain, I am sorry. They are still trying to get Agent Romanoff stabilized, you would really just be in the way. I can promise you they are doing everything they can for her, and you being in that room will do nothing to help." Steve thought differently. He knew how badly Natasha was injured, he knew that she might in fact be dying. He knew he could never live with himself if he didn't at least try to be there for her. In case she woke up before... Well, in case she woke up. He wanted to be there just in case. Even if she didn't wake up, he hoped that maybe she would sense a friend was nearby.

"Doctor, please. I respect you authority in the hospital, and I understand how I could be an annoyance or distraction. Couldn't I just stand in a corner, be there for her? Please? I would like for her to know that she isn't alone. I don't want her to be alone if she wakes up." Steve said this smoothly, trying to appear calm and hold back his temper.

The Doctor almost snorted. "Captain, if she wakes up she will not be alone. She will in fact be surrounded by some of Shield's top doctors. Now if you will excuse me, we will contact you if there is any change." The Doctor turned and was about to walk through the door. Ok, enough Captain Nice Guy. Time to pull out the big guns.

Steve slammed shut the door that was just beginning to open, he held it shut as the other man attempted to open it. Ignoring his protests, Steve leaned in closer to the Doctor. "Sir, I am sure you know all about Agent Romanoff. You know her medical history, missions she has been on, things of that nature?" The man struggled to open the door. "What? Of course I do Captain! This is ridiculous, open the door!" Steve didn't.

"And Doctor, I am sure you know about Romanoff's... Powerful friends." The man stopped pulling the door at these words. He glanced at Steve. "What, you mean the-" "The Avengers." Steve interrupted. "You know me, but have you met the others yet? Dr Banner, for example? Oh I am sure you would get along splendidly with him, both being in the medical profession. And Bruce is quite fond of Natasha! Protective, I would go so far to say. He is the nicest guy... Well, unless you make him angry. Or upset. Or perhaps if you do something that could hurt one of his friends. Then he really can't be held accountable for what he might do." The Dr. gulped, and tried feebly pulling at the door again. Steve continued holding it shut, and speaking.

"Oh, and then there's Thor of course! Good old Thor, very nice for a DemiGod! You do know he resides on earth now, don't you? Yes, quite convenient if we need him for anything! Let me tell you, he is a bit tough looking if you don't know him, but once you get acquainted he is the nicest guy!- Unless you upset him. Of course then you may just find how tough he is! And boy, is he loyal to his team. Good fighter too! Extremely good." The doctor was sweating now, he opened his mouth to feebly explain again why Steve couldn't enter the room, he was interrupted.

"Let's see who else... Oh of course, Mr Stark. Well you know what, Stark and I aren't the best buddies, but he and Agent Romanoff actually are closer than you might think. Not many people know that! They worked together before he was even recruited, did you know that? Few do. Really one hell of a story! You should hear it some time. Of corse Stark doesn't have his suits anymore, and that is a shame." The doctor relaxed slightly, at least one of the Avengers wasn't a threat to him. Then Steve opened his mouth. "Oh, but of course I forget, Tony is pretty amazing when it comes to computers! Do you know he once hacked into Shields personal files? Shields personal files! He got all of them! Isn't that something! Yes sir, I imagine it would be hard for a person to hide anything from him. Or better yet, with a few clicks of the nmouse Stark could probably do amazing things. Empty a bank account, access anyone's files, probably even erase a mans identity." The terrified Doctor was more than ready to open the door now, when he tried to Steve still held it closed.

"And of course, you already know Agent Barton. Don't you? Of course you do. You know, the master assassin, extremely skilled with a bow, rather eager for revenge when necessary. And how long has he been Agent Romanoff's partner? Eight, ten, I think could it be eleven years? Wow, there is commitment! Dedication! Loyalty! They are quite a pair, aren't they? So good together, so close." Steve didn't have to say anymore, the Doctor was already picturing Natasha dying. Clint finding out that he, the Doctor, wouldn't let Steve, the closest thing Natasha had to a friend on the ship, into her room. He would probably be dead or seriously injured within a week. All the poor man could think of was the fact that Barton was the best in the business because he specialized in kills that could not be traced back to him...

Pale and shaking, palms sweaty the Doctor cried out. "Captain! Please! I promise you, we are doing what is best for Natasha! Having you in there will not help her! I promise!" Steve just stared the man down, leaning heavily on the door. The doctor cracked. "I- I think that- Yes, I will see if we can have her moved to one of the rooms used for teaching students. It has an adjoining viewing room where you can check up on her whenever you want, without disturbing anyone. I believe her condition has stabilized enough for a small movement- Besides, the teaching room is better prepped for an emergency surgery if needed. Just- wait ten minutes! Just stay here! I will send a nurse out if Romanoff is moved. If not! I will let you in to see her! I promise!" Steve paused to think about this, it sounded like a pretty good idea. He would have preferred to be in the same room as Natasha, but the last thing he wanted to do was get in the way of people who were helping her. If she was moved to this other room it would be better for everyone from the sounds of it. Steve lifted his hand from the door, nodded assent at the cowering doctor. "Thank you. Go." The doctor swung the door open, slammed it shut behind him.

Normally Steve would feel guilty about putting on an act like that, but now he was to concerned about Nat. Honestly deep down inside, he knew his being in the room with her would probably not help her. But it was the only thing he could think to do right now that might make things a little bit better. Well, that and find Clint.

Before long a nurse came out, she was short and petite barley coming to Steve's elbow since he was so tall. She looked half terrified, and half star struck. He rather loathed the star struck expression he saw on far too many agents, newbies mostly. Agent Fury had explained a couple weeks after New York that the Avengers were not celebrities, but agents like everyone else in Shield. There should be no autographs, requests for photos or as he put it "fangirling". Of course you can't exactly order people to not feel star struck by someone, though Steve wish you could. And they did stop requesting autographs- So Stark had started charging ten dollars for his instead. Tony had actually made a tidy sum from that little scheme.

The nurse had a squeaky voice. "Captain, Agent Romanoff has been moved. You can follow me now." She kept staring at him. He didn't care except it was annoying. He just wanted to be by his friend. He followed the nurse as they walked through identical sterile halls, passing what felt like hundreds of dull gray doors. Finally they stopped in front of one of the doors, it had the words "Viewing Theatre" on it. The small nurse opened the door for Steve. "Here Captain, thank you- uh I mean, good luck? Um-" The girl was flushed and unsure what to say. "I mean, I am sorry about Agent Romanoff. I hope she recovers soon." Steve smiled at her politely, and entered the room.


	4. Chapter 4

Steve entered the viewing room, it was all neutral colors with an uncomfortable looking row of chairs in front of a large glass window. He instantly gravitated towards it and peered intently into a bustling crowded hospital room. He couldn't hear anything through the glass, but he had a clear view of everything. The Doctor who had blocked his entrance was scrubbing up his hands at a sink in the corner, another was fiddling at some kind of monitor with a flashing yellow light. Steve didn't know what that meant. A third and fourth doctor were examining a thick folder that was crammed full of papers. Nurses were everywhere, carrying trays of tools, IV bags, bandages. And at the center of all this activity was an oasis of complete stillness.

A sterile white bed had wires and tubes snaking out from and around it, a seemingly massive wall of machines was to the right of the bed. With lights blinking, numbers appearing and every screen showing or doing something different, Steve wished he knew what it all meant. Because of course, in the bed was Natasha. Who else would it be really? He had expected and wanted to see her, but it was still startling.

He must have forgotten some of her injuries, why didn't he notice the dozens of cuts and scratches covering her face, and what could be seen of her arms? Was that giant red mark on her neck a burn or just a bruise? Wait, that was where she had been cut. Shouldn't that be bandaged by now? Someone had pulled Natasha's hair back away from her face, without the colorful red locks she looked utterly pale and devoid of any color. A nurse came up and hooked Natasha to an IV with clear fluid, and then to another with a large bag of blood. She must have lost more than Steve thought if she needed a blood transfusion.

The next hour or so was a confusing blur for Steve. He didn't understand half of what was going on, and because he couldn't hear anything being said he was even more in the dark as to what was happening. Everyone was moving rapidly around Natasha, administering shots, replacing bandages, putting in stitches, prodding and examining injuries. Steve noticed that an unusual amount of attention was focused on Natasha's spine. He remembered the way her back had felt in his arms, how limp her legs were. What happened if someone's back had a fracture or even worse a break? Could a person recover from that? Could they even walk again? Was that what was wrong? Would it KILL them to have ANYONE come in and explain this to him? Steve had so many questions, but he didn't want to enter the room and distract anyone from their work. That could be disastrous. After a long time, the movement had slowed down somewhat in the room. Steve felt a bit of hope warm his heart when he saw many of the doctors and nurses looking somewhat more relaxed, a few of them even left. After another half hour a doctor (not the one he had spoken with earlier) came into Steve's room- he was relaxed but wasn't smiling.

"Hello Steve, I'm Dr. Olsson, it's an honor to meet you." He held his hand out, so Steve shook it. "Well, I have some good news and some bad news about Agent Romanoff." Here the Dr. paused, hoping Steve would request what he would prefer to hear first. He didn't.

"Well, I'll just explain her condition to you then. It appears she was not so much harmed by the explosion, but rather by her collision with the wall- especially after it collapsed on her. Her head must have hit something, because not long after you both arrived she slipped into a coma. It's not that unusual, she should wake up within the next few days. And we have been working on a couple dozen surface wounds, some of the cuts were rather deep. Especially one that almost nicked her jugular vein, but luckily it didn't. She has two broken ribs, and we need a few more X-rays. We thought she had internal bleeding in some form or other, but for some reason those symptoms have disappeared. We have to keep an eye on that. We have her as stabilized as we can get her, but time is critical. We have to operate, probably within the next couple of days. We're going to wait for some specialists to arrive for the operation, but we expect to proceed as soon as possible."

Steve nodded at this, worry gnawing at his gut. Internal bleeding was definitely not good, what if they began operating and found the problem was more serious than suspected? How do you even fix that? It can be fixed right? His shoulders slumped. This whole situation sounded a bit better than he hoped, but it was still pretty bad. At least they had hope she could recover. "Well, what's the good news then?" Steve asked, hoping it would be reassuring.

But the Dr. winced slightly, his stance changed. "Um, actually that was the good news. She is stable, only two ribs are broken, and we can operate once the whole medical team arrives." Steve's stomach did a backflip. "What's the bad news?" He asked, dreading the answer. "Well, you see, Romanoff's back and legs seemed to take the blunt of the force when the wall fell. Her legs are broken- you could even say the right one is twisted. We have to operate and set it properly, but with luck and time they should heal. With anyone else I would say they don't have a chance of walking again, but I've seen Romanoff heal from some pretty amazing injuries. She might recover from that. But her spine... A few of her vertebrae have cracks, and two of them are almost jammed into one another. We need to operate on them."

Steve frowned. "So besides the obvious problems, what's bad about all this? Her not being able to walk again?" The Dr. sighed. "Well, that is one concern. But also the operation is... Dangerous. It is not without risks. If any mistakes are made, since the spine is connected to the brain any number of things could happen. She could lose all use of her lower half, she could wake and be in pain for the rest of her life, lose sense in her nerves, go blind, the spine and nerves connected to it are very tricky to deal with. You need to know that any number of things could go wrong resulting in her becoming brain deaden some way or, well, simply dead."

"And what if we don't operate? What then?" The Dr frowned. "She would probably die. Her spine definitely has some form of bleeding going on, and it's so badly mangled that if she woke up and began moving too much she could twist and injure something further. Its a very delicate situation, so many different possibilities for what could go wrong… So many. If we don't operate she will live whats left of her life in so much pain, that she will wish she was dead, until she dies from complications."

Steve scowled at this. "Let me get this straight, if you don't operate she dies. But if you do operate, something will still likely go wrong that would result in Agent Romanoff dying! Are you telling me that's the situation?"

The Dr stammered. " well, I didn't say- What I mean is- I just wanted to prepare you in case of anything. Um. We are going to, we are doing, our best. Really. We are going to do everything we can." The room spun around Steve, he felt ill. Natasha was most likely going to die. She was going to die. He may as well have killed her. It was all his fault.

"Doc, can you honestly tell me what you think the final outcome will be?" Steve asked, dreading the answer. Apparently the Doctor did too. He hesitated and dawdled before speaking. "Well, Captain, we are going to do everything we possibly can do for her. You have to believe that." Steve interrupted, "Yes, but what do you think will happen?" The other man sighed. "I'm sorry Captain, I'm going to help and do my best. But I wouldn't be sure about recovery. It's rather unlikely."  
-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

It took Steve forty two minutes to find Maria Hill. He had to talk to someone, and he didn't know anyone else on the ship well enough. Or at all, really. Plus he needed to know if there was any update on the location of Clint, or the other Avengers. He found her in a small office, removed from the always busy hub of Command Central. It wasn't her official office, she probably wanted to be away from people. The door was ajar and she was tapping away at a small laptop, a slew of papers and files covered the desk. She didn't look up from her work, but instantly knew Steve was there. She wasn't really sure why she knew it was Steve, she just did. She told herself she was too busy to look up at him and have a decent conversation, in reality she knew she was too scared. Of Romanoff dying. Of seeing the guilt in Steve's eyes, scared of the guilt she kept pushing down inside of herself.

"Hello Captain, I hear you got in to see Agent Romanoff?" She asked, eyes not flickering from the screen in front of her. She didn't see him nod before she continued. "I know why you're here, so I will just get to the point. We have recovered enough evidence that we are positive Barton has been kidnaped. There is no doubt about it. We have compiled what we know about the last area he was known to be in, and are trying to calculate who most likely has him, and where."

Steve felt even more hopeless than he had a moment before. If Bartom was kidnapped, it could be weeks before he was found. Natasha could be dead before then. If the operation failed she could even be dead by next week. "Are there many places he could be?" He asked, tackling the problem he could solve first.

Maria was searching through the papers on the desk now. "Well of course, but only three that I would recommend pursuing. All of them are around the area he was last seen, two of them run by terrorists one by a kind of a Chinese version of the mafia. They would all know who Barton is, and have reasons for wanting to apprehend him. I am going to recommend we search them as soon as possible. Besides even if they do not have him, we have business with each of them anyway. You know, kill two birds with one stone, that sort of thing. Thy way even if they don't have Barton we can get some work done."

Well it's good they have some idea of his location, but this didn't sound at all reliable to Steve. He leaned up against the desk, and looked down at some of the papers. He saw some of them were from Natasha and Clint's personal files, respectful of their privacy Steve averted his eyes from these. One page had a photo of Coulson, with the small word typed next to his name. Deceased. Looking up, Steve found Maria's eyes staring at him. Embarrassed, he moved back and asked her.

"And what if he isn't in any of these places?" Cap was worried about this, luck was not with him lately. And it would be pretty lucky if Clint was this easy to find. "Do you have any other ideas? Any leads?"

At these words Maria slammed her laptop shut. "No. Actually I don't have any idea where he might be Captain! Sorry to disappoint you. If Barton wasn't so pig headed I could locate him with a tracker, but he refuses to have one on his person, same as Romanoff. I already have the council breathing down my neck over injuring one of their top agents, and losing the other, both on the same day, so unless you have any other ideas maybe you could just let me work?!" She said all of this very quickly, never raising her voice. She didn't have to because the frustration in her eyes spoke volumes.

Taken by surprise, Steve moved back towards the door a few steps. "Agent Hill, I wasn't criticizing you, I was only asking a question! I know you are doing everything you can, I was just trying to think. Plan ahead. I am impressed you even found any possible places Clint could be, I would have no idea where to look. Really. When do you think I should leave to find him?"

Maria frowned at this, still breathing heavily, cheeks flaming in anger and embarrassment. She shouldn't have had an outburst like that . "You? Why do you assume you are going?" Steve shrugged. "Maybe because you and I know the best chance of retrieving Clint alive is to get the Avengers together? Maybe because I am one of your best soldiers?" (Maybe it's because if Romanoff dies, I owe it to Barton to at least save HIS life after I failed to save his partners…)

Steve walked forward, made eye contact with Maria for a few seconds that lasted for a burning eternity. "Maybe it's because if I am not assigned to this mission, I will steal a jet and fly to Asia myself to retrieve Barton. And you know I will, it wouldn't be the first time either."

Maria couldn't argue with this, but hesitated before answering just so that it wouldn't seem she was giving in too quickly. She had been planning to assign Steve on this anyway, it would be better than having him just waiting here for Romanoff to die. "Ok then, I will recommend you for the mission. Anything else I can do?"

Steve knew Natasha might not have very much time, he had to get Clint soon. And that meant one thing.  
"Assemble the Avengers."


	5. Chapter 5

Tony Stark  
NYC, 1:29 AM

Tony was up late again, not because he couldn't sleep but simply because he didn't want to. He was in his workshop, fiddling with his latest project. It appeared to be a laser weapon that could instantly stun, rather than kill. Like a far more sophisticated version of a tazer, complete with the ability to awake who you stunned on command with a separate gun. The only problem was that Tony was having trouble finding people to test it on, even though he had sworn it would be painless. Upon hearing he was looking for guinea pigs to test his latest toy on, Pepper informed Tony she had to go on an "unplanned" business trip for a couple days. So, Tony used the one guinea pig he could always depend on.

"Aaaaaah! Oh god, Jarvis, how long was I out that time?" Tony asked, rubbing his head where he had stunned himself. "You were unconscious for forty two minutes, and twelve seconds sir. It should be noted I began attempting to wake you one minute after you stunned yourself though. I think you still have a few bugs to work out." The computers voice was more than a tad sarcastic.

Still rubbing his head, Tony stood up. "Gah, ouch, dammit. Ok Jarvis, make a note, subject woke up with a severe headache, and some nausea. I think we need to lower the number of electrons, and maybe narrow the beam of the laser... I wonder why the wake up gun didn't work. Maybe we should try a small dose of adrenaline added to that shot?" Still rubbing his head, Tony moved to the coffee pot and poured himself a large cup. "I guess Pepper was right in not wanting to test this one. Don't tell her I said that though!"

Jarvis spoke. "Sir, perhaps we should continue this project on people other than you? If you had not woken soon, I feared I would need to call an ambulance. Or at least a doctor." Tony waved his friend off. "Oh come on Jarvis, I can handle this! Let's uh, call it a night? And we can get back to it tomorrow. Sound good?" "Oh yes sir, quite."

Tony and Jarvis shut down the workshop, and Tony headed to bed. He was almost to his room when Jarvis spoke, trying to sounds casual. "Oh, by the way sir, when you were unconscious you received a phone call from Shield." Tony stopped walking. "What, really? Well, tell them I'm too busy to fly into anymore wormholes for them. See if Superman's available for all I care."

He entered his room, Jarvis's voice followed. "Sir, this call seems rather important. I did take the liberty of recording a message, and I should tell you it concerned Agent Natasha Romanoff." The name made Tony pause, this was different. He owed Natasha big time. When they first met he had a crush on her, but not anymore. They were not friends exactly. But they had fought a war together and he owed her his life. If she hadn't helped him find the component for his second arc reactor, if she had closed that hole in the sky a second sooner- he would be dead right now. He owed her enough to listen to this call. More than that, seeing how he literally owed her his life twice over.

"Ok Jarvis, play the damn message and then I'm going to sleep." "With pleasure Sir. I will begin playing it now."

The voice of Maria Hill filled the room. "Stark, this is Agent Hill from Shield. I am calling to inform you that Agent Romanoff has been injured in the line of duty, and that Agent Barton has been apprehended somewhere in Asia. We need you to come in so we can get Barton back, preferably as soon as possible. We will contact you soon, if you do not contact us within the next twelve hours we WILL come to get you."  
The message ended.

Tony sat on his bed for a minute absorbing this information. He had fought with Natasha and Barton a few times since New York, what injury had to be bad enough that Shield would contact your friends about it? Or at least contact your fighting partners. If they got Natasha out, why was Barton still being held by enemies? There was obviously more to this story. Tony glanced at his bed, wishing he had spent the night sleeping instead of tinkering with his new toy. But he had to go. He owed her this. And Barton was a decent guy, he couldn't stay here in good conscience.

"Jarvis, please call Shield back and ask where I should meet them, can you get me more coffee? And I'm going to need a suit. Pull out Mark 53 please."  
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Thor Odinson  
London England, 9:35 AM

Thor and Jane were still in England, they had work to do. After the merging of the nine realms happened here, Thor had some jobs to finish up. And Jane had an excessive amount of other worldly things she could examine, so she was more than ok with staying here. But just last month, Thor had rounded up the last few creatures that had escaped from the realms. Now he and Jane were unsure if they wanted to stay here, or go back to America. At the moment they were happy here, but they were not the kind of people who could be content in one place for long. They were considering going on a trip around the world, since Thor wanted to see everything in this realm that he could.

But at the moment, he was happy just having breakfast with the woman he loved. Jane was not the best cook, so they were eating in a smallish restaurant where Thor was unlikely to be recognized. Though now that he wore clothing that wasn't armor, he was rarely stopped by gushing strangers anymore. Thor was digging into a half dozen plates in front of him, as Jane picked at what was left of her omelet.

"Are you sure you don't have work here anymore, Thor? It would be awful if we left for, Africa or somewhere, and had to come back because of something like an invasion of fire elves that slipped by you." Thor smiled at her. "What? No, there are no fire elves... Lava Imps, yes. But I am positive I got all of those. I promise everything other worldly is gone from London."

Jane smiled at this, and reached for his hand. "Well, almost everything..." The two grinned dopily at each other for a second. Thor squeezed her hand gently. "Jane, even if there is any danger remaining here I could easily fly back to vanquish it. It wouldn't even take a day, I am ready to travel with you, do you agree it is time that we explore this realm together?"

Jane looked like she was about to swoon. "Ok, sure, whatever you say... Let's leave this week then..." They leaned in to each other and were about to kiss- then Janes phone rang. "Oh darn it, don't move, just let me answer this..." Thor grinned at her, still leaning over the table waggling his eyebrows. Jane answered the phone.

"Hello? I'm sorry, who? Maria Hill?" Thor sat back, mild surprise on his face. He remembered Maria, she had been nice enough to him when last they met, before he and the Avengers had to vanquish the Chituari. Why would she be calling Jane?

"What? You're with Shield? Oh,come on, what awful thing do you want from us- um, I mean, me, this time?" Jane was silent as she listened to the phone. Her expression darkening by the second, when she spoke again she did not look at all happy. "Fine. Give me a minute, just let me see if I can find him." Jane pulled the phone away from her head, covered the speaker with her hand. Thor, it sounds serious. She won't tell me much, but wants to talk to you about a mission of some kind. She knows you're with me, thats why she called my phone. She wants to talk to you, but says you don't have to agree to do anything if you are too busy here... DO you want to talk to her?" Jane asked, half fearing his answer. Thor nodded, held his hand out for the phone. He still wasn't used to the delicate little devices that he seemed to crush so easily. Jane had gone through five phones since Thor arrived. Not wanting to break another, he held this phone with the very tips of his fingers.

"Lady Hill, it is a pleasure to speak to you again. To what do I owe the pleasure of this conversation?" Jane waited as Thor listened to the phone for the next few minutes, not saying much. Just nodding, occasionally saying "I see" and then, "I'll be there as soon as I can." When he hung up, his face was grim. He gulped at his large mug of coffee, draining it in only a few swallows. He was silent for a few moments, Jane waited a beat before asking. "What's wrong? Is... Everything ok?"

Thor glanced down at his full plates, and pushed them away. His appetite was gone. "Natasha Romanoff has been gravely wounded, they do not know if she will make it to see another week. Her comrade in arms, Clint Barton, has been apprehended by enemy forces. The Avengers are being called together to rescue Barton, in the hopes we can bring him to Lady Natasha before she leaves this earth. They want me to go help them, do you approve of this?" Thor looked to Jane, waiting for her answer, hoping for her consent to let him go without feeling too guilty about leaving her.

Jane knew about each of the Avengers, Thor had spoken of them all, but several times of Romanoff and Barton, saying he had rarely seen two people who fought together so well. He had once told her Natasha was fierce enough to fight with anyone from his own realm. He admired the lady warrior greatly, had told Jane he hoped to fight with the black widow again one day. Thor had also mentioned he suspected deep feelings rsn between the two assassins.

Jane knew that Thor felt loyalty fiercely and deeply. And he was loyal to The Avengers, they were his new army. Just as she was his new family. Besides, this mission didn't sound dangerous. He would just be rescuing Clint, that should be simple for Thor. He'd be back within a few days. And even if this mission was dangerous, how could she not let him go? If the situation was changed, if she was dying, and Thor couldn't get to her, wouldn't she want the team to help rescue him before it was too late?

She smiled, "Thor, you know you have to go. Just- be careful, ok? I am sure everything will turn out fine. With Shields medicine Natasha will probably be healed, and if the team is assembling, you will find Clint in no time! I will be ok with you gone for a few days." Suddenly a lump was in Jane's throat, she tried to swallow past it, but then she was on the verge of crying. Thor hadn't been far from her since his return from Asgard. Last time she thought he would be gone for just a little while, he was gone for well over a year. He had said he would be back, then seemed to abandon her. That wasn't something she could just forget. What if this time again he didn't come back? What if he got hurt and couldn't come back? Seeing the tears sparkling in his loves eyes, Thor moved to her side of the booth, wiped them away. "Jane, what is wrong? It is as you said, surly Natasha will be fine!" Feeling awfully selfish Jane shook her head choking on her words, she was shaken up by the news of an Avenger on deaths door, but that wasn't her main upset right now. "No, it's- it's not that! Just promise you will be careful! Promise you'll come back to me!"

Something in Thor's eyes darkened, he tenderly wiped another tear from Jane's eye. He felt a sharp stab of pity for Barton suddenly. "Jane, I love you, and I promise I will always come back to you. We've talked about this. I don't care if I have to cross a country, or an ocean, or a planet or a galaxy. I will always find a way to get back to you."

Jane opened her mouth to speak, more tears stole down her face, but then Thor leaned in to kiss her. And in that moment, everything was going to be ok.

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Bruce Banner  
2:41 PM Chenai India

Bruce always knew he would probably come back to India. He had had a nice few months hanging out with Stark, designed some new software for his suits and made some pretty interesting weapons- all nonlethal of course. But he couldn't take being in a large city where so many people recognized him. Every time he went somewhere crowded, he imagined what would happen if he hulked out. He wishes that like Natasha and Clint, he could have had his image wiped from all broadcasts about the New York Incident. Because too many people know who he is now. Every day in new york they wanted to talk to him, thank him for saving them, so every day he felt guilty. He didn't do that. A monster did. He still had trouble coming to terms with the fact that he could control the Hulk, that no longer were the two separate Before he could say he was Bruce Banner, and the Hulk, the monster, was inside of him. After New York he had to admit the two were now practically one and the same. He finally cracked when a little boy recognized Bruce, and told him that when he grew up he wanted to be a Hulk too. Banner felt his heroism was a lie, he couldn't do this anymore.

So he came back to India. Here he could help people, be a doctor again. He was busy every day, doing good work. No one knew him here as anything other than "doctor". He was happy, but also lonely. He sometimes wondered if he should have stayed with Tony a bit longer.

It had been a long day, he was called in to the local hospital to help with an emergency appendix removal, at least the patient had survived. It was a close call though. Exhausted, Bruce headed back to his apartment. It was small, and u personalized. He wasn't the kind of person to fill a home with knick knacks or photos. He made himself a cup of tea, and sat at the table with his laptop. He was surprised when he saw he had an email, more so when he saw it was from Shield.

He read it quickly, read it again to process it. Natasha injured, Clint missing. He knew he had to go help. Maybe he could just help with his brain, they didn't say they needed The Other guy. And even if they did he would still help. He had almost killed Natasha before, if she was dying now he should help by bringing Clint to say goodbye to her. In ten minutes Bruce had his bag packed and was requesting that Shield pick him up that evening.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> -whispers- reviiieeeeeeew

Steve was in the viewing room again, he couldn't remember how long he had been here. It could have been half an hour, or an entire day. It was hard keeping track of time in here, this room was so separated from the rest of the world. He stood at the window, watching nurses and doctors do their jobs. Everyone looked tense and nervous, they were still waiting for the specialist to arrive for the next operation. Apparently he had another job that needed completing before he headed here.

Steve hadn't gotten an update on Natasha's condition for a while, but she still looked the same. Unconscious, pale, still, exactly the same. People in comas don't really change much, as Steve was finding out. The room was sedately busy, everything appeared to be normal.

And then, a red light began flashing on one of the monitors. Steve couldn't hear through the glass, but as soon as the light started blinking every head in the room turned towards it. Apparently an alarm was also going off. People dropped what they were doing, mouths were all moving fast as doctors ordered nurses to do things, everyone looked scared. A second before the room had almost been peaceful, now it was a hive of activity and movement. Steve had to know what was going on, he ran for the door and tried to open it. It was locked. He returned to the window, and started pounding on the glass.

"Open the door! I command you to open the door! What is happening? WHATS WRONG?" Either the other room was soundproof in reverse, or Steve was being ignored because no one even glanced towards him. A tray with medical tools was being wheeled in, new doctors were flooding the room. Steve couldn't even see Natasha anymore, just a crowd of people clumped around her. Tools began being passed to whoever was in the middle of the crowd. Shots, oxygen mask, bandages. Scalpels. Knifes. Scissors. Were they operating now? What was happening?

Steve returned to the door, in his horrified mind, he had to get it open. Had to. He could find out what the problem was, he was a super soldier! He could fix it! He could save her. He couldn't let her die. But when he returned to the window, every face in the room was grim. He saw no hope in those faces. He resumed pounding the window, why couldn't he break it? What the hell was this glass even made of? More tools were being passed into the center of people, none of them looked good. Steve recognized one of them as a defibrillator.

For ten minutes or so, he watched as the doctors did everything they could to save his friend. They tried. They tried everything. Steve did not see the moment when Natasha died, he saw the moment when the doctors gave up. When they dropped the tools, lifted their hands, and backed away. A nurse pulled a sheet over Natasha's body. When the crowd of people had slowly dispersed, Steve could still see some red hair peeking out from under it.

He was in shock. Pure shock. How could someone who had always fought so hard, who had such a will to live, die like this? Not even awake? Slipping away so quickly? He felt tears begin burning his eyes, ashamed he looked down to blink them away. When he looked up, Natasha was next to him. Or something that looked a lot like Natasha.

Maybe he should have been shocked, or surprised. He was so grieved he just stared at her. "Natasha, I'm sorry. I'm so so sorry. It's all my fault, it's all my own damn fault. I failed you! I killed you!" Steve wouldn't let himself cry, but he was close. Natasha just stared at him, with accusatory eyes. She didn't say anything. Steve continued. "I failed you! You trusted me to watch your back, and I FAILED you! I failed the team! I'm sorry!" He wanted to grab her hand, knew that even if he tried he couldn't touch it.

Natasha opened her mouth. "Steve, find Clint. Please find Clint- before it's too late." She smiled sadly at Steve, reached out to touch his face. The second she did, he woke up.  
-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

Steve was in his bed, in the room Shield had provided for him. He was drenched in sweat, for minutes he just sucked air in and out of his lungs. He got out of bed, entered the bathroom. Splashing cold water on his face, Steve reassured himself he was now awake. Catching his breathe, he stared at his reflection in the mirror. His hands curled into fists. It was only a dream. Just a horrible awful nightmare of a dream. Steve was no stranger to nightmares, but he usually knew he was dreaming. This had felt so- real. He touched the place on his face where Natasha had touched him. It was all so real.

He knew he wouldn't be able to sleep now, so he got dressed and decided to find Maria. It was early (4:13 AM) but he somehow doubted she was sleeping. This time, more familiar with the ship, it only took him twenty minutes to find her. This time Maria was in her normal office, still on her laptop. A steaming cup of coffee within her reach. She didn't look surprised when Steve came in, but then she rarely looked surprised. "Captain, good morning. Why are you here?"

Steve hesitated. Why was he here? He suddenly felt like a little boy who got scared of a nightmare, and decided to run to the closest thing he had to a really had no reason to be here. "Um, do you happen to have any- uh, coffee?" Maria lifted an eyebrow at him. "Captain, we have a fully stocked cafeteria where you can get that. Is that really why you are here?" Blushing, Steve stuck to his lie. "Yeah, I'm... Too tired to walk to the cafeteria. Do you have any?"

Maria just stared at him. Then, she sighed irritated as she closed her laptop. There's some in the other room. Just a minute. She left, leaving Steve alone. He felt stupid now, Maria was a very busy woman. She didn't have time for this, for him. She didn't have the right mindset for friendship. So why did he come here? Why did he keep tying to connect with her? She came back in, set down a styrofoam cup in front of him. She hesitated, and then dumped a handful of various sugars and creamers besides the cup.

"I wasn't sure how you like your coffee, so I thought if you wanted sugar or something you could add it." Steve was a bit surprised she had thought to do this, it was uncharacteristically considerate. "Oh, thanks. I actually like a couple sugars and the cinnamon creamer- so thank you. I appreciate it."

Steve said this sincerely, Maria have him a look he couldn't explain. Almost like she wasn't used to people thanking her for things. She shook her head a bit though and went back to her laptop. "It's nothing. You might want to know that I have contacted the rest of the Avengers, they should be here today. Stark, probably this morning. We are hoping he and Banner can help us pinpoint Barton's location. The surgeon for Romanoff arrives tomorrow, so now we just have to wait." There was nothing to do now, no words to say. Maria was typing away at her computer again seemingly oblivious to Steve. But just being by her made him feel better for some reason he could not explain. He sat down, dumped a few packets of things into his coffee cup, and sipped at it. They each knew there was nothing either of them could do now except wait. Wait for The Avengers to arrive. Wait for Maria to be ordered to another assignment where she was more needed. Wait for someone to pinpoint a more likely location for Clint. Wait for Natasha to heal or to die.

And so, Steve and Maria sat together in the office. Waiting.


	7. Chapter 7

The air ship was flying- somewhere. Not aiming for any destination, just continuously moving, and everyone was on high alert. Because the Avengers were coming. It was very exciting for those who had never seen them before, nerve wracking for those had been present last time the team was together on one of these ships. When Agent Barton had  
gone rogue, and tried to kill everyone on the ship. You know, right before aliens came down and killed everyone they could in NYC. No one knew about Agents Romanoff and Barton being individually compromised, no one knew why the team was coming together. But it was all that anyone was talking about.

Rumors were spreading like wildfire- A new superhero was being inducted in the team, an atomic bomb was threatening to destroy the planet, Shield was firing the team, Shield was firing all the agents to replace them with superheroes. Bigfoot was found and they want Thor to communicate with him, Atlantis was discovered only everyone living there wanted to kill earth. They found Superman and wanted him to join the team, the Avengers were going into outer space. So yes, the rumor mill was having quite a busy day. Only a couple dozen people actually knew the truth, almost all of them knew if they did tell the truth they wouldn't be believed anyway. Why should the mighty Avengers assemble, just because of two agents? Just so that in case one died, the other could say goodbye? Besides, it was much more fun to speculate that the team was assembling to star in a new reality TV show.

Of course, Thor was the first one to arrive. When all you need is a hammer to fly, travel is really quite easy. He was even faster than Tony in the sky- In spite of all his inventions Tony just couldn't match the magical speed. The sky was perfectly clear one minute, so when a thunderstorm materialized out of nowhere, everyone knew exactly who was coming. Thor arrived with surprisingly little fan fair, using his hammer to fly towards the ship. He simply landed on the roof, and knocked on the nearest door. Loudly. He didn't think that anyone could hear him, so he continued to knock louder and harder. It was purely accidental that he happened to break down the door. He still wasn't totally used to living in this realm, and would forget his own strength.

And it was an even bigger accident that two agents were walking towards the door when it flew off its hinges- at least Thor managed to catch them as they went flying out the door and off the air ship. Most everyone agreed it really could have been much worse than it was. At least the agents were huge Thor fans, they were just excited they got to meet him! Let alone be SAVED by him! How awesome! Still, it was decided the decks would be watched carefully until Stark arrived. They didn't need him burning a laser hole through the wall to enter, not that anyone would put it past him. He did like making a grand entrance.

Thor wanted to immediately see Lady Natasha, and was happy to hear his friend Steve was aboard the ship. He requested to see either of the two, but was refused. Instead a woman who felt like the luckiest agent on the ship, escorted Thor to the cafeteria. Having skipped breakfast with Jane and flown many hours through lunch, he was starving. He was eating through his third pizza and thirteenth "snack sized" bag of chips when Bruce arrived.

Luckily the aircraft was not too far from India, so the small plane picking Bruce up did not have a very long journey. A small crew manned the plane, everyone had had to volunteer for this pick up. The slight possibility of Bruce hulking out when on a confined flying plane was a rather large liability for Shield. Still, everything went smoothly. The flight was calm and once the staff got over their unease, they found Banner to be surprisingly nice! Except that when an agent asked for his autograph, he outright refused to give it. Quite bluntly. Nervous, no one asked for one after that.

Last time Bruce arrived at an air ship, he had almost no clue what was going on and did not even have anyone to greet his plane. THAT had been an unfortunate mistake! They thought he was arriving at a different deck, he just felt lucky he had not gotten- "upset" then. At least Steve and Natasha had found him then. This time he again had almost zero clue what was happening, but at least an agent greeted his plane.

He was a large burly man, something Bruce found grimly amusing. As if size and bulk could do anything against the hu- The Other Guy. Just look at one of the only people to ever escape his counterpart unharmed. That would be Natasha. She was slight and small, and most importantly fast. He hated to think what could have happened if anyone else had been trapped with him during that unfortunate experience. It was horribly lucky it had been her.

The Agent was all business, Bruce tried to be friendly but was bluntly ignored. He asked, "So, do you enjoy this job? Must be pretty interesting!" The man had not even glanced at him. "That is confidential. Follow me please." So, irritated, Bruce silently followed him through empty rooms and hidden hallways. He was deposited in a very nice laboratory, given a file to read. Within minutes Bruce had processed the information and begun tracking Barton's location.

As for Tony- well, he was utterly Tony. He refused to tell Shield at what time he would be arriving, also declining an exact location of the Ship. He mentioned something about testing out a new tracking system, and only asked for the number of the ship. Maria was extremely irritated at the entire situation, and ordered that small planes circle the ships perimeter so they could pick up Stark when he inevitably got lost.

So why didn't they see him? He was supposed to be here hours ago, but no one had seen him yet. They had tried calling him, he refused to answer. Or if he did, pretended to be his own Answering Machine. It was really extremely annoying. Especially once he started making up naughty songs about why he couldn't answer. It was getting late, some if the agents were getting nervous. What if something happened to the mighty Iron Man? Why wouldn't he answer the phone?

One newbie agent was not too worried about Stark. Not because she knew anything, because she simply didn't care. She was extremely efficient, and (like Agent Hill not all that long ago) thought the nonsense of a "superhero" team was a waste of time. She could care less about why the team was assembling, she just wished they could assemble quickly so they could leave.

She was working hard, and went to her office. A small room, with no decorations. Just walls of file cabinets. She walked in, sat at her desk. Wait- she didn't leave that file out. Why wasn't this drawer locked? Had someone- had someone been snooping in her office?

"Hey, how are you doing." The agent looked up and screamed. Tony Starks face was floating in midair in front of her. No body, no head, just a face. She screamed again. He spoke. "Hey! Hey! Calm down woman. Yeah, it's me. I understand you must be excited- I mean how many people have THE Tony Stark in their offi-"  
The poor woman found her voice. "What the HELL! What the HELL are you DOING in my OFFICE?" Why are you a HEAD? WHERE IS YOUR BODY?"

Tony frowned. "Hey, my body is right here! I'm not some kind of freak who can just detach my head you know... See, this is a new suit and I'm still trying to work the bugs out. It's stealth mode, you know? It can go invisible and I can be invisible to anything trying to detect me. I got the idea from a, close friend. Unfortunately I stupidly added a feature that-" The Agent was losing patience. "Get to the point!" He quickly continued. "I have a lockdown mode on the suit, so if needed I won't move or be found. Clearly it went haywire. And so I have been invisible and unable to use internet or call anyone- I'm stuck. You have a really isolated office, no one even heard me yelling! If you hadn't come in I don't kn-"

The agent interrupted again. "WHY were you in my OFFICE!" They both knew the answer, Stark was famous for snooping in every personal place he shouldn't. Especially at Shield. Still, Tony didn't answer- Instead he smirked and asked, "Hey, babe, do you know if Banner is on the ship? I kind of need help getting out of this thing. Tell him to bring a laptop, and a crowbar."  
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Steve was still in Maria's office, he had been for the entire day. He thought it would be awkward, and was surprised when it wasn't. After his nightmare he was too scared to spend the day in the room adjoining Natasha's. Scared his dream might come true. Neither was he in the mood to be anywhere other agents could crowd around him. Fawning over him, asking for autographs, asking mundane questions- He just couldn't do that.

Actually he probably would have stayed in the hospital room anyway, except a doctor came every hour or so to give them updates on Romanoff's condition. He had not known Maria requested these updates, it touched him that she cared enough to ask for them.

Maria worked all day, arranging the travels of the Avengers and, well, usually doing busy work to distract herself. Natasha was in the same condition. Stably unstable. She hated to think of it and whenever she stopped working her limited imagination would conjure up dozens of horrible scenarios. So she did her best to stay busy and immerse herself in files and paperwork.

Meanwhile, Steve drew. He started with a few small doodles, as he got more and more into it though more and more drawings began creeping over Maria's desk. At first she was a bit annoyed, wanted to ask Steve to go back to his room. Then she began seeing his drawings, and better yet watched him draw them. She would never admit it and never let Steve know, but soon she was actually enjoying watching him. No one had ever drawn anything before her eyes like this. It was almost like she could pretend he was drawing for her.

But that was stupid to think of. Wasn't it? A few times Maria had to tell herself to quit watching Steve, and get back to work. She told herself she wasn't watching him, she was watching him draw. And that was totally different. Totally.

Finally, she received a message that confirmed the final Avenger had arrived- had been found to be more specific. Maria couldn't help but wonder how long Stark had been here. She just hoped that he hadn't been able to do much snooping before his suit went into lockdown mode. She should tell Steve his team had arrived- but she wanted to see him finish this drawing first.  
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	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This was a bit of a dribble chapter I wrote at a friends request....... But hey! Wanna review it?

Maria was alone in her office, Steve had left almost half an hour ago. So why did her eyes keep flicking over to the chair where he had been sitting? To the piece of paper, with a half finished drawing on it? Instead of focusing on her work, Maria kept staring at things like the yellow pencil resting besides the small pile of drawings. The lead tip was dulled, and a small crack ran through the wooden point. So did that mean he preferred working with pencil? Did Steve ever use paint, or ink, pastels? Wasn't that an art form? Maybe. She didn't know... It wasn't like knowledge of art supplies was part of her resume.

She was wasting time. This was idiotic. She didn't care about art or drawing! It was nice enough, but she certainly didn't have time for it. She used to, but that was years and years- and years, and years and years ago. Basically a really long time. She took an art class in high school, she'd almost forgotten about that until now. It wasn't THAT long ago, but- well, she didn't like to dwell much on her child/teenage hood. She had so few good memories from those years.

Now truly irritated, Maria snapped her head back to the computer. For almost ten minutes her only thoughts were about soldiers, missions, files, surplus and ammunition. Just like they should be. Then she grabbed for a file, and somehow made the pile of drawings slide off the desk. They gracefully floated down to the ground, as Maria cursed to herself. Just when she was getting in a work groove, something had to distract her. Well, it would be rude to leave the drawings on the ground. She may as well pick them up.

Moving to the ground, Maria glanced at her close door. It would be so embarrassing if anyone walked in and saw her, a prominent officer of Shield, kneeling on the ground like some kind of a maid. She'd never live it down if anyone came in. Moving quickly, she gathered up the papers. They had not fallen very far off the desk, so how had they gotten everywhere? Still trying to be businesslike, she didn't look at any of the drawings. She just so happened to glance at one.

She was not one to have outbursts of positive emotion, especially now with the lives of Romanoff and Barton weighing so heavily on her. But a slim smile actually appeared on her face when her eyes landed on this doodle- It was a caricature of Stark, wearing an extremely over exaggerated version of his suit. Too big for him, with a dozen different objects sticking out of it. Such as bottles of alcohol, a bobble head of Pepper Pots, a few weapons etc. It really wasn't all that funny, but Maria was stressed out. Besides she had little fondness for Stark, anything mocking him could amuse her. Plus Steve had drawn him as a little man with nothing but a big suit of armor to protect him. That was funny to her. Without thinking, Maria began looking through the rest of the drawings without thinking.

A surprising number of them were of nature or animals. A family of monkeys, a horse bucking someone off, dragons flying, a waterfall and brook in the forest, snow falling through sky. Steve grew up in a smoggy city, it did make sense he would have learned to draw places he wished he could be and creatures he'd like to meet outside of the Brooklyn Zoo. One drawing covered two pages and was a circus parade, filled with beautiful horses, tumbling clowns, elephants with riders, the whole thing was so intricate that Maria was lost in the details for moments.

She had not realized how much Steve had drawn, she hadn't kept track of time. How long had they been here? No, um that sounded wrong for some reason. How long had she been in here working and how long had he happened to be in the same room when drawing? That was better. Some pages had only a few random strokes on them, a half drawn flower, a face she couldn't recognize because it was unfinished. Many more drawings were complete though. His favorites seemed to be from scenes of classical books. Some typical like Alice falling down the rabbit hole, the troupe of creatures walking down the yellow brick road, flying monkeys hovering above them. Others she recognized from books like Gone With the Wind, or Grapes of Wrath. She hadn't known that Steve liked reading. Apparently she had something in common with him- well, that and the fact they were both soldiers.

If she was the kind of person who could be self indulgent of her own likes she probably could have gotten lost in the drawings for a long time. But she wasn't, she was Maria Hill and she didn't have time for her own wants or needs. So she regretfully tore herself away and gathered the drawings together. They made a sizable stack, she placed them on her desk. Sat down. Started working, and stopped. She rarely allowed herself to look at things like art, hated indulging herself. Maybe she could later though? At least waste time not during work hours? Maria picked up the drawings, and neatly placed them in a desk drawer.  
If she had to look at them, she would just do it during her personal hours.


	9. Chapter 9

The Avengers were together again- well, the majority of them were at least. Except one was captured, another maybe dying, and the third was just late. Steve wasn't here yet, a fact that annoyed Tony to no end.

"See, just another reason why it makes sense to always be fashionably late." Stark huffed, slumped in his chair pouting. "Not only can you make a statement of how much more you value your own time, but you don't have to wait for idiots who call a meeting and then don't show up for hours!" Bruce was sitting across from Tony, looking at something on his phone. He didn't even glance up when he spoke. "Really Tony? Steve is hardly hours late. He scheduled the meeting for one thirty, it is now one forty two. He's probably preparing a presentation or something, maybe he had to clear this meeting with one of the higher ups. He'll be here soon."

Tony opened his mouth, probably to shoot off some off colored remark, but Thor interrupted. "The Captain is a man of loyalty and honor, if he is late he surely must have a worthy reason. Let us wait a short while longer, and if he does not arrive perhaps we can go in search of him?" This sounded like a good enough idea to the science bros, and so the room was quiet.

Tony was still fuming over the embarrassment of being caught snooping. Damn that Jarvis! He should have warned him the suit wasn't ready! Wait, actually he might have done that anyway. But darn it, he could have done something! At least helped him unfreeze the suit! Wait, the speakers and internet must have been jammed too. Why? What had he done wrong, how could he fix it? Soon Tony was lost in his mind, planning how to make his latest toy even better. Bruce was still on his phone, trying to track Clint and wishing he was back in the lab. He was a genius, but even a genius can do only so much with a cell phone when they are trying to pinpoint someone's exact location. Thor meanwhile, sat in his chair. If only he had brought one of the books Jane had introduced him too, or at least something to eat. He wished the other teammates would speak to him, and was more than glad when Steve arrived.

He didn't look like the Captain America they were used to. Not because he was wearing something as normal as a T-shirt and jeans- No. It was like a light had been extinguished in him, as if he had seen the worst thing he could see, and maybe hadn't come out stronger because of it.

Tony greeted him, "Hey Capsicle, what did you raid a Gap? Nice threads!" Steve frowned, clearly it was too much to hope that Stark could ever be serious, even under awful circumstances. Just one more reason why the man rubbed him the wrong way. He pulled up a chair, and sat down. He made a point of not sitting at the head of the table, he just knew Stark would make a barb at him if he did, something about how just because he was called "Captain" didn't mean he should be the team leader.

Thor was smiling broadly, he reached over and shook Steve's hand enthusiastically. "Captain Steve! It is a pleasure to see you again, even though I regret it is due to an unfortunate situation. Still, words can not express how pleased I am to be reunited with all of you." Thor's smile shrank somewhat as he added, "though of course, we are not all here. But do not fear, I am confident that with us fighting together, we can reunite the rest of our team!"

Enthused by his own speech, Thor stood up and clapped Steve (lightly, by Asgard standards) on the back. The Captain still had the breathe knocked out of him, and was speechless for a few seconds. Gasping for oxygen, he feebly patted Thor's arm, and sank into his chair. Tony rolled his eyes, for a super soldier this guy could be such a pansy. When Steve could breathe again, he greeted Banner. "Bruce, how are you? I am glad you could make it."

Compulsively working on his phone, Banners eyes flitted away from the screen for a second, muttered something that might have been a greeting. Then he was again sucked into his work. Tony considered taking out his own tech candy, the last thing he wanted was to hear Steve drone on for hours. But he WAS anxious to hear about Natasha, and even he had a limit on his utter rudeness. Especially after living with Pepper for a few years. Anyway Bruce was working on his phone, Tony really had no excuse to take his out and start playing Angry Birds.

Once Steve could breathe normally again, he gathered his thoughts and started explaining the situation . He was blunt, and to the point. He didn't dance around the truth, and admitted that he felt responsible for Natasha's injuries. He painted himself in a negative, self decrepitating light. None of the other Avengers fully believed him. Of course they saw he might have been somewhat responsible for their teammates injury, but what could he have done? None of them believed Steve had been as careless and idiotic as he had convinced himself he was.

Never a fan of pity me, all my fault, I injured someone and maybe killed them stories, Tony changed the subject. "Ok ok, so Spidey isn't doing well, and needs to have the surgery. If it succeeds she might be fine, if not she'll, well- die... What's the deal with bird man?" Steve opened his mouth, but Bruce was the one who spoke. "Well I have marked off quite a few places he might be, I can definitely say he is not in Africa, Antarctica, or Canada. I also don't think he's in Aisa. Just because he was last heard from there, doesn't mean he wasn't apprehended and then moved somewhere else. I need some time to prove it, but I doubt he's there."

Steve's eyebrows lifted. "Really? Ok, well that's interesting. How long do you think it will be before you can locate him? Any guess?" Banner shrugged, "Sorry... I could find him in the next hour, or it could be a couple weeks. But with Shields technology I think it should be within the next day or two." The team was silent for a minute at this. From the sound of it Natasha might not have even two days left. Tony spoke up, uncharacteristically serious. "So I guess one of the real questions is if she should have the operation as soon as possible, or if we should wait a bit in case we can find Clint. It sounds like she is hanging on now, but if that surgery goes wrong- We all know what could happen."

Banner spoke. "Personally, I think that she should have the surgery as soon as the doctor arrives. This sounds harsh but she isn't even awake now. Clint wouldn't get any comfort except from seeing her one last time- As a doctor I don't think that is worth postponing a serious operation for. If we wait it could cause complications." The team thought about this, and Steve said, "Ok then, I'll tell Mari- uh, Agent Hill that we want them to operate as soon as possible. I'll show you guys where Natasha is so you can... See her if you want." The underlying message was clear. So you can say goodbye.


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I am not sure what happened here when I was writing, seems I made them all see Nat in the next chapter though I had just said they were going to go see her...... Whatever, might fix that later.

Banner was back in the lab, working hard at the computers. He had narrowed down roughly three fifths of the world where Clint was NOT. Asia was one of those places, so their only lead was gone. It was four in the morning, and Bruce was so tired he couldn't remember if he had stayed up through the night, or woken up stupidly early. Coffee. Coffee had to help. He sleepily walked across the room, and punched orders into a coffee maker. He stared sleepily at the machine, waiting for the caffeinated liquid to collect in the mug. He was so. Tired. But he just had to find Clint, he owed Natasha, anything he could do for her he would.

Bruce had nightmares almost every night, but they were rarely recurring. Just vague memories of the horrors the other guy had committed, and possibilities of what he could do if Bruce ever really lost control. Even after New York, he was terrified about what could happen if The Hulk took over. And since then, he had earned a nightmare that came at least once a week. The room exploding. Falling. Searing pain as his head hit the ground, something being shaken loose inside of him- Something he couldn't put back in place. And Natasha trapped besides him as the Hulk began escaping. She couldn't move, and she was only trying to help him. And because she wanted to help, he had wanted to kill her. That was his nightmare. Only in the dream... When he was chasing her... She didn't escape him.

Beeping from the coffee maker startled Bruce from his thoughts, without thinking he grabbed the steaming mug and gulped down a mouthful. "Gah, argh, unnnn" he moaned, trying to handle his burning throbbing mouth without getting angry. He shut his eyes, tried to clear his mind. An image of Natasha running from the "other guy" entered his thoughts instead. Banner calmed down oddly enough, remembering her fear reaffirmed his desire to never make anyone feel like that again.

Work always helped distract him when he felt at all angry, or guilty. Now sipping at his coffee, Bruce returned to his computer. He was determined to find Clint before the surgeon arrived for Natasha's operation.  
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Meanwhile, Tony was in another lab, trying to fix the lockdown of his suit. He and Bruce had started off sharing a work space, they quickly learned it was best if they only worked together when they were actually working on a project together. If they each had different projects going on, Tony got all into Bruce's space, Tony kept telling Banner how he should be working, they basically got on one another's nerves. Tony eventually kicked himself out, and wandered around until he found a lab that suited his needs. So what if he had to dodge a few guards, pick a few locks and override a security system? All that mattered was that he was comfortable when working on his suit!

He had been in here as long as Banner had been in his own lab, but he was able to handle the lack of sleep far better. He had cured the permanent lock mode the suit entered- by removing that entire feature from the program. He would tinker with that another time, and put it in his next suit. With a mission coming up he didn't need any problems when in the field.

Tony felt good about this suit, finally most of the bugs were worked out, and he would have to let Pepper know that he finally fixed the- Oh crap Pepper. He had forgotten to tell her he was even coming to shield, thinking this would be a quick thing- and she arrived home tonight. No, scratch that, last night. This was really not good. He was going to be in so much trouble.

"Jarvis!" He ordered, speaking to the laptop that he had hooked up for his virtual friend. "I need you to check my phone and email and see if I have any messages from Pepper... And you better have a florists number prepared." Stark held his breathe waiting for the answer, and though he dreaded it he was not at all surprised by it. "Sir, you have seventy three emails, one hundred and thirty five missed calls, not to mention three hundred and fourteen text messages. Would you like for me to read them?"

Tony groaned, this was not good... Pepper must be so mad and worried. He was lucky if she hadn't called the cops out to look for him. "Jarvis! Please order the biggest bouquet of flowers that you can find around home, and compose an Email for Pepper." Tony drummed his fingers against the table, trying to think of what could be said.

"Ok, write this down. "Pep, Hi! I am alive, and not kidnapped harmed etc etc. I know I am in huge trouble with you, I should have called you or left a note. I am flying over an ocean somewhere, on a quick job for Shield. I did not think it would take this long, they gave the impression that I would be done by now. Nothing serious is happening over here, Legolas has been captured and we have to find him. Red had also been injured on a mission, she isn't doing well. I'll keep you updated on her condition. I miss you, I would call you but don't feel like being yelled at right now. I hope you don't kill me when I get back... I love you, I'll be back soon."

Tony was quiet as Jarvis typed this up, the email was sent and the lab silent. Tony was missing Pepper a lot, he hadn't seen her in almost a week. It sometimes stunk being in love when both people in the relationship have to travel away from each other so much. He was really missing his girlfriend though it was far from the first time they had been apart. All of this stuff with Clint and Natasha was probably just making him more grateful that Pepper was safe and healthy.

Not for the first time, Tony wondered what the relationship was between the two agents. He had asked a couple times before, and was told that if he wished to keep all the pieces of his body, he shouldn't ask again. Were they a thing? Just friends? Woah, what if they were married? That would be too crazy a thing to keep hidden. It didn't matter why the two were so close, Tony just wanted to help them. If anything then just because if something like this happened with him and Pepper, he had to hope the team would do just as much to help them as they were doing for Clint and Tasha.

Suddenly very tired, Stark ordered Jarvis to shut down the shop. He was going to go see if Banner needed any help.  
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Meanwhile, Steve was back in the waiting area adjoining Natasha's hospital room. He had decided it was stupid to avoid the place just because of a stupid bad dream. Besides, when he asked to spend the night in Maria's office (did the woman ever sleep? She was like a working machine.") she had refused. Saying she was sorry, but she had to focus on some important work. Why did Steve care about this? Had she actually hurt his feelings? He didn't want to think about this right now.

Natasha looked totally unchanged, the only difference in the room was the lack of medical personnel. Just a couple nurses monitoring her, and one unlucky doctor who was present in case anything went suddenly wrong. Someone had brought a couch into the waiting area, so Steve didn't have to stand anymore. He wondered who was responsible for the new piece of furniture, though he had a pretty good guess. Not that Hill would ever admit to placing it if he thanked her for the place to sit.

Steve had come here soon after meeting with the rest of his team, after being kicked out by Maria he found his way to this room. He hadn't slept well for what felt like days, and was utterly exhausted. But he was too scared to sleep. If he slept he would have another nightmare. Maybe if he gave in to sleep, when he woke up Natasha would be dead. Maybe... Maybe...

The next thing Steve knew, he was laying on the couch and someone was shaking him. "Captain! Captain! Wake up... Steve. Steve! Wake up already!" Startled out of sleep by whoever was roughly shaking him, Steve sat up and exclaimed, "Aaargh, gosh, what is it? What's wrong, what happened?" Still half asleep, he assumed it was an emergency. Then he realized someone was grabbing his hand, and wasn't releasing it. "Steve, " Maria Hill said. For once sounding like a human instead of a soldier. "Stark and Banner found Barton, they located him! Come on. They want to wait till everyone is present, Stark went to get Thor, I have to bring you."

Steve was sitting up now, and as Maria finished talking there was a slightly awkward pause. His eyes flitted down to her hand wrapped around his own, Maria let go. She backed away, the excitement on her face was completing gone. She cleared her throat. "Well then. Come on, everyone is waiting for us. For you. They are waiting for you, I just volunteered to come get you. I mean, I was asked to. Come on." Embarrassed, Maria turned away and walked out the door. Still feeling drowsy, and extremely confused, Steve followed her. They were halfway down the hall when a rush of thrill and excitement rushed through him. We found him! We can get him back in time! Finally something was going right.


	11. Chapter 11

Tony and Bruce were now wide awake, Bruce because he was on the adrenaline high of finding Clint. Tony probably because he was continuously drinking from a large mug of coffee. He was pacing excitedly around the room, randomly picking up objects, tinkering with things he shouldn't be touching, and repeatedly wondering out loud where the rest of the team was.

Thor entered the room, hair tousled from sleep. Though he had obviously been sleeping, he looked a hundred percent awake and ready for anything. "Tony, Bruce, what news do you have for us? Good I hope!" Bruce started to speak, but Stark interrupted. "Nooooope! Nuh-uh! I don't repeat myself. Ever. Let's just wait for Captain Lazy, and get this over with so I can go to bed." Tony was usually fine with staying up late, but he hadn't really slept since he got the call from Shield. He was exhausted, and kept pacing around, hoping the movement would keep him awake. He topped off his cup of coffee, even though it had practically been full. His eyes were heavy with exhaustion as he complained. "Oh gosh, I told that woman to get Capsicle ages ago! How incompetent can you get? She is the weirdest, freakiest, coldest- Ugh. When I see her I'm going too-"

"You don't want to finish that sentence Stark. Trust me." Steve said as he walked into the room with Maria Hill. Her mouth was already open to defend herself, and when Steve spoke up for her, her cheeks flushed. A scowl covered her face, and slightly embarrassed, she turned away from the team. Steve didn't notice, intent on receiving the news. "Well? Did you find him? What can you tell me? Hurry! Let's get this over with!"

Tony rolled his eyes, muttered to Thor, "Wow, and I thought he was the polite one."The demigod chuckled a bit, not fully understanding if this was a joke or not. Bruce closed a laptop, and gathered some papers from the printer. "Ok, as everyone knows, at first we thought Barton was in Asia. That's where he last checked in with Agent Hill, and where his target was located."

Bruce started handing out the papers to his team, each person got an extensively marked map. He handed the last map to Thor, and awkwardly turned to Maria. "Um... Sorry, I, didn't know you would be staying for the meeting. Sorry! Just, give me a minute, I just have to pull up the file again- Oh I didn't save it. Let me find the map, mark it again, then-" As Tony groaned in exhausted irritation, Steve spoke. "She can just share mine, I don't mind." Realizing he might have overstepped his boundaries, he turned to Hill. "That is, if you don't mind?" She shook her head, spoke just a bit too quickly. "It's fine. Thank you, I don't mind. Let's just continue." Steve let her hold the paper, and they stood besides each other. Maria felt uneasy, because why did she feel so uncomfortable standing besides this man? This was a business meeting. She shouldn't even be thinking of who she was standing next to.

Bruce continued. "So, Clint has a tracking device in his arm. It's Shield protocol ever since the, well, New York Incident. If we could have found him sooner then, well the battle might never have happened. And I was able to track his progress for a few hundred miles, when the signal went dead. This could be because he entered a spotty area, or possibly someone removed and destroyed the device. Though I have no idea how they would have found it. Now, if you look at this map...-"

The next half hour was extremely informative, and at any other time the team would probably have been attentive. If it wasn't five forty in the morning. Tony just kept guzzling coffee, trying to stay conscious. Thor wasn't tired, but did not understand half of the things Bruce was talking about. Steve was inpatient for Banner to just get to the point, and Maria- Well, she was busy feeling confused. Bruce was in full on lecture mode, glasses on top of his head, sleeves rolled up. By the time he was discussing wind patterns and tracking traffic patterns, everyone had reached the end of their patience. For once Tonys tactlessness came in handy.

"Bruce! This is a meeting, not a freaking classroom! It is five! In! The MORNING! I haven't slept in TWENTY FOUR HOURS! Get to the POINT man!" Stark groaned, head in his hands. Startled from his speech, Bruce looked sheepishly around and then back down at his papers. "Oh, yes, sorry... Due to the evidence I have here, I think Clint is in Alaska."

Looking at the pattern on the map, Maria nodded. "Ok, but why would he be there? We don't have any tracked groups we are watching there. Do you think something new is rising?" Tony shrugged, and spoke up. "That's always a possibility, Shield monitors potential threats, but one could always slip through the net." Agent Hill furrowed her brow, staring at the map. The dot where Barton was presumed to be was isolated, and surrounded by mountains. This might be a difficult mission to plan. "Ok. I am going to go start figuring this out, make some calls, and see what I can do to help. If all goes well, I imagine you should be leaving some time later today." She turned to Steve. "Um, may I take this?"She tugged lightly on the map, half of it was in his hands. He let go instantly, "Oh, of course. Here!" Maria nodded a thank you, and was gone.

The team stood in the room, unsure of what to do next. Steve spoke, again becoming the leader without even realizing. "Let's get some sleep. We need to be well rested, and ready for whatever might happen today. And, well, if you want... Before we leave- Natasha is in Ward Three. If anyone wants to visit her."

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The entire Avenger team could have easily fit in the viewing room, said goodbye to Natasha together. Instead individually the members filtered into the room throughout the day. They respected each other enough to give the others privacy for their goodbyes. Thor was the first to see her, he was used to visiting the bedsides of friends who had fallen in battle. Still, he felt a bit uneasy at the thought of seeing Lady Natasha unconscious and in the care of healers. He always thought of her as strong and untouchable, he was not eager to have this thought marred. Still he soon found himself asking a random agent to lead him to his friend.

He purposely asked a male agent, growing tired of the gushing, over excited women asking if he wished to have a drink with them, and giggling every time he spoke. Most of the time the women dispersed when he mentioned Jane, but those who did not leave were more obnoxious once his love was mentioned. One even implied he was lying about having a girlfriend, and that she was free any time for a date. He hoped that this man helping him would keep silent, and not ask any questions. Sadly, Thor had chosen poorly.

The next ten minutes were, in a word, annoyingly awful. First the man gushed over the demigod. Exclaiming over his huge size, jokingly asking where his armor was, and asking if his hair was naturally blonde. Whatever that meant. But then, things went from irritating to horrible. The agent had been discussing the fight in NYC, going on and on about the details of Thor's fighting style. Then he started talking about Loki.

Hardly anyone knew of Loki's death, just a few people in Shield. Actually only Maria Hill and Nick Fury, and Thor had requested they not tell anyone. So this small little agent was bad talking Thor's brother, calling him a monster, inquiring about the punishment he was receiving on Asgard. Saying how because of Loki, one of Americas greatest cities would never be the same. Half of Thor wanted to murder this man, and the other half felt beyond guilty for the misdeeds of his brother. And still, he missed Loki.

By the time they arrived at the door that would lead Thor to Natasha, he couldn't even look at the agent who had led him here. If he did, he just knew he'd do something he regretted. So Thor walked through the door without saying goodbye, and the Agent scurried off to brag to everyone about how now he was totally best friends with the mighty Thor. There was a hallway once Thor passed through the door, but he knew where he had to go now. Lady Hill had told him. First though, he paused here to gather his emotions.

He knew Loki had cast a great hurt upon this realm, and of course maybe his brother had been somewhat evil. But he still was, would always be, his brother. And Thor missed him deeply. It had hurt so much losing Loki the first time, this second loss was even fiercer though. He had been given a chance to have his brother back again, and Thor felt that he had failed. He could have reasoned with Loki when they met again, stopped him in New York maybe. He could have overpowered him sooner and prevented the Chituari invasion. He could have... Should have, visited him when Loki was a prisoner. Now it was too late though. He wished his brother had been a better person. But he also wished he could still be here.

Emotions now somewhat under control, Thor entered the viewing room to see Natasha. He was not used to the healing rooms here in this realm, he had only been inside of one other, when he first arrived on earth. And that experience had been far from pleasant. He stared into this one, hoping the healers- no wait, Jane had explained they were called doctors here. He hoped the doctors, were nicer in this place.

Being taller than Steve, Thor had a much better view of the fallen Avenger. Her wounds were clean and bandaged, her eyes closed as if she was sleeping. You almost would think she was sleeping. If not for the deeply pained and disturbed expression on her face. The demigod had never seen Lady Natasha so still, or so pale. A horrible random thought entered his mind, what would he do if Jane was in this situation? He shut his eyes and wished he was at her side.

A thought occurred to him- Did Barton and Lady Natasha perhaps have feelings for one another? As more than friends? He wondered why this had never occurred to him before. Though he never had been very good at recognizing, or even understanding romance. Even if the two agents were not in love, Thor understood the deep bonds those who fought together could forge. And the pain of losing your fighting if Barton did not love Natasha like that, Thor knew the pain of losing his partner in wr would be no less for Clint.

Thor moved closer to the glass, and spoke softly, "Natasha, I swear to you, I will do everything within my power to bring Barton to your side as soon as possible. You are one of the mightiest fighters I have met, in this or any other realm. And I know that you can defeat your injuries, and regain full health." Thor began to turn, then had a thought. He slowly turned back to the window. "And Natasha, I hope and believe that you will recover. But if you do not, and you pass on to the unknown, please find Loki. Tell him I am sorry for not helping him more. And that I miss him deeply. I know you only got to see him at his worst, but I promise you there was more to him than that. Even though this world will only ever know him for his misdeeds, I promise you there was good in him too. If you meet him again and find him, I promise you will learn to see that good."

With that, Thor left. Blinking away the burning in his eyes.  
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Bruce was the next visitor, and though as a trained doctor he was allowed into the actual hospital room, he preferred to say in the viewing area. He wouldn't admit it, but he felt safer this way. More removed from the situation. The glass wall was just one more barrier innocent people would be blocked by if he became the other guy- Though honestly the wall would be little more than tissue paper to him. Maybe he was also scared. He had years of experience in hospitals, but had never had to see a close... Could he call Natasha a friend? A close coworker? A close anyone, he supposed, injured and in a hospital setting. He was almost sure he wouldn't "overreact". But it was the mistaken "almosts" of his past that haunted him.

He viewed the room with a clinical eye, he was surprised by how removed he felt from everything. He had worried he would be upset by seeing Natasha injured, feel disturbed by needles running into her, and seeing her being covered in bandages. Instead he didn't even feel like he was seeing Natasha, just another patient. Bruce calmly read the machines he could see around her bed, and was glad to note how efficient the staff caring for her seemed.

Of course, Natasha really didn't seen like herself. She had a look on her face of pain. But something else too, something subtle. Few would recognize the expression of fear on her face, because who would think someone in a coma would look fearful? But Bruce recognized that look. He recognized it all too well. He dreamed of it far too often, a more pronounced version of that fear staring up at him, right before the hulk emerged. Why would someone in a coma be scared? Did she know she might be dying? That Clint wasn't at her side? Was she having a nightmare?

Bruce watched the room for almost an hour, monitoring the machines and making sure the doctors were doing their job. By the time he left, he was sure Natasha was in good hands. But he didn't feel much better.

?

Steve didn't go say goodbye to Natasha. Maybe he was superstitious, but he just felt like if he said goodbye he would be, well, saying goodbye. Forever. If he didn't say bye, maybe she wouldn't be allowed to die. And he could bring her Clint. It wasn't that Steve didn't care about bidding her farewell, he just felt scared. A doctor had reported to Maria and himself just a couple hours ago, that Natasha's decline was increasing, but slowly. For some reason the surgeon had not yet arrived, people were starting to worry about him. Steve just didn't want to see his teammate even worse than she already had been last time he saw her. He didn't consider the raging guilt he would feel if Natasha did die, and he never said goodbye.

Instead he was sitting in Maria's office, helping plan the rescue mission of Barton. They had pinpointed his position to a mountain, and air footage sent back photographs of what could possibly be some kind of hidden base. Because it was in the mountains, sneaking in would be a problem. Not to mention they had almost no clue what they might find inside. This mission didn't have time to be carefully planned and choreographed, anything could happen.

"You guys probably don't need much supplies, right?" Maria asked. "Obviously a first aid chest and rations will be on the plane, but this shouldn't take long. You won't need much." Steve nodded, impatient for the planning to be finished so he could leave already. Piles of paper, and open books were smothering Agent Hills desk. After not enough hours of sleep, Steve had come here to help this morning. They had gotten clearance to go on the mission, arranged for an airplane, mapped out their route, it seemed everything was done! So why wasn't he leaving yet?

Maria stalled too. She was fighting herself, one part wanted to cooly dismiss Steve and go on with her work. The other part, was wondering how she would feel if he died. Wondering if she would regret not saying goodbye to him. She fumbled with words, and then said, "Be careful Cap. Can't afford to have anymore of you guys injured." Steve grimly smiled a bit, "Well, I'll do my best but I can't make any promises."

Suddenly Steve stood, accidentally knocking a file crammed with photographs and papers to the floor. "Ugh, sorry about that!" He apologized, both agents knelt on the floor attempting to gather everything back, still in the same order. Maria was very aware of how close he was to her, and when she looked up, he did too intending to ask a question. They made eye contact, and paused. They were not close enough to kiss, but just close enough to maybe think about it for a beat of time. Seconds stretched out, Maria was so confused, what was this? What was happening? A small shiver went through her, she hoped Steve wouldn't notice.

Steve had no idea what to do, he liked Maria, but could she possibly feel the same way about him? He opened his mouth to speak- When a voice came from a speaker in the room. "Agent Hill, we have an emergency in Ward three. Stark has broken into the hospital room with balloons and cupcakes, and he is playing rock and roll music from the speakers. He claims he is "Throwing Agent Romanoff a get well party? He's disrupting the medical staff- Please stop him. Please!"

The two parted, and stood. Steve spoke. "I'll go get him, you have a lot of work to do. And I should get him anyway, we have to go. Can you tell Thor and Bruce to meet us at the ship?" Maria's throat was closed, she just nodded. She managed to choke out a professional goodbye, and sat back at her desk. Confusion swirled around her. Romanoff was dying, Barton was in enemy hands, things were falling apart, she didn't have time for this nonsense, and with Captain America of all people.

But she had had time to say a real goodbye to Steve. She already regretted that she hadn't.


	12. Chapter 12

Steve was not happy with Stark at all, to put it mildly. The team was on a plane to Alaska, and the two men were arguing. Again. Stark was sitting sullenly in his chair, listening to Captain America lecture him. "Natasha's in a COMA! Why on earth would you throw a person in a serious medical condition like that a party? You disrupted her medical staff, tied a balloon to her IV, and yelled at a nurse when she told you to leave! We were on a hellicarrier. Where on earth did you even get cupcakes? And balloons for that matter?" Steve was saying all this as if he was speaking to a very young child, Tony was running out of patience. "Listen "Spangley", I thought a party would cheer her up! Maybe she'd know that someone was doing something for her. How was I supposed to know the balloon would pull her IV out, or that one of the nurses was allergic to the coconut in the chocolate cupcakes? And it is NOT my fault if after eating one, she fainted on top of a monitor. I'm the victim here! I was trying to do something nice, and because of it everyone is attacking me." Before anyone could speak, Tony stood. "THIS is not a supportive environment, I'm out of here." He scowled as he walked to the other end of the plane, sat down and put his Iron Man Mask on. Probably to talk to Jarvis, or listen to rock and roll music, or enjoy not having a medical team yelling at him.

Steve sighed, he still had more to say to Tony. But the team didn't need any more inner conflict- they already had far more of that than they should... Besides, before the team arrived at what could be Barton's location, he had some things to discuss with Bruce. So he moved to sit next to the scientist, and as an afterthought called for Thor to join him. He wasn't fully sure what to make of the demigod, he was something of a mystery to the team. How do you act around someone who is a prince, something like a god, and has a brother who almost destroyed New York City? But the Avengers were a team, so Steve had vowed to include Thor in more things. Bruce was typing away at a tablet, glasses perched on top of his head, the seat besides him was totally filled with papers, notebooks and files. Steve sat across from him, when Thor joined them, Bruce still hadn't noticed the two. He was so focused on his work, the plane probably could have started falling and he wouldn't notice.

Steve didn't want to alarm a man who could become the hulk, even though he did have a much better handle on it nowadays. He didn't want to poke him or anything- Unlike Stark, HE didn't have a death wish. He would have to plan a way to get his attention, it would have to be not too startling, nothing that could panic Bruce, if he just said his name would that startle the man too badly from his work? Maybe he could-" Thor suddenly leaned forward and said in his booming voice, "Banner! We have need of your knowledge!" Steve jumped violently in his seat, startled by Thor almost yelling next to his ear, and horrified by what Bruce might do next. The scientist also jumped a bit in his chair, and looked surprised, but after a few tense seconds, Steve saw he was not angry. He looked more annoyed.

Bruce closed his laptop, and frowning a bit, turned to the demigod. "Could you maybe not do that again Thor? I was working. And you kind of startled me, and I would rather not let- the other guy, out on a plane. That wouldn't be too good for anyone." Thor looked sheepish, and smiled as he spoke more quietly. "I apologize, I forget at times that I must learn to be more quiet when I speak. I suppose I am used to noise, and volume- Jane is helping me control my level of sound though... She is just so good, she helps me so much! Why once-" The two single men were not in the mood to hear about Thor's girlfriend. It just made their thoughts go to sad lonely places they didn't want to visit. So Banner tactfully interrupted Thor's discussion of the time Jane took him to the London Zoo.

"Steve, what did you want? How can I help you?" Thor sat back in his seat, slightly embarrassed, when the Captain started talking. "Can you go over what we know about Clint's position again? Any leads on where he could be, coordinates, possible organizations that would have taken him?" Bruce took a second to gather his thoughts, then dug an atlas out from his pile of papers and files in the seat next to him. "Ok, all I know about Clint's mission, is that he had to assassinate someone, near the city of Changzhou in China. All other details of that were classified." Banners eyes flitted towards Tony, who still had his helmet on. "And though if I needed to, I could obviously get my hands on that information, with some help, I didn't think it was crucial.

Clint performed the assassination, we know this because I am told the body was found on the last day Clint had contact with Shield. But we never heard from him." The atlas was opened to a map of China, and Bruce spent the next few minutes going over how he tracked Clint through several countries and continents. He explained that the tracker had been sending a fairly steady signal, and had been in the place they were headed for two days. But then, the signal died. If the tracker had not remained in one place for so long, it could have simply been removed at this position. But the maintained position, was evidence that they were located at some kind of headquarters or prison. At the least maybe a hospital type place, where the tracker may have been removed.

Steve frowned. "If you used the tracker to find Clint, why didn't Shield do the same thing? They are the ones who knew he had it. Shouldn't we have found him before now?" Bruce shook his head, "Well the signal was not consistent. I think it was being blocked, I only got random readings off it." Now the man took his glasses off, and met the eyes of Thor and Steve. "I should tell you guys this, something seems a bit fishy. The signal was blocked well, maybe fifty percent of the time. And just where I thought I was losing the trail, a new signal always came up to show me where Clint went. It was a little too easy, once I got the hang of it. It might be that Barton was doing this. Helping us out by somehow randomly unblocking his signal. But it seems more likely- That this is some kind of trap. That someone is waiting for us.

The three Avengers processed this thought, they knew they could likely avoid any trap, but it was still a troubling thought. Many people wanted the team dead. Criminals, underground organizations, heads of crime groups, terrorists, the list was quite lengthy. And just because they weren't aware of any group in the area Clint's tracker had last been monitored, didn't mean one wasn't there. Waiting for them.  
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It was a very long flight. Jet lag was making the entire team tired and irritable, Bruce was consumed by his work, Tony only took his helmet off to eat- apparently he had some movies downloaded to it. When Bruce suggested he project the films on the wall a everyone could watch, Tony suggested he shut up and get back to work. Thor dozed off for most of the flight, and Steve- well, sat in his chair. He hadn't grown a fondness for cell phones or many electronic devices, and when Banner offered Cap a spare tablet to entertain him, Steve quickly got a headache from playing on it. He had not brought any books or drawing supplies, so most of the flight was spent in pure boredom for him.

His thoughts drifted randomly. He kept reliving the mission that went wrong, that resulted in Natasha's injury. Could he have done anything differently? Maybe. He could have made sure Bucky was dead, been more attentive. He could have tried to protect her. Steve was still racked with guilt, but now with more than enough free time on his hands, he realized there was not a lot more that he could have done to help. It didn't make him feel much better. Just a little less guilty.

Sporadically Steve's thoughts went from Natasha, to Agent Hill. Why, he didn't really know. She just popped into his head, and then he couldn't stop thinking of her. They'd had some nice moments the last few days, and be really couldn't explain why those moments had happened. Sitting in her office together, Maria having the couch put in the viewing room for him, and most of their interactions today. When she woke him up and held his hand for a second too long. He had seen her watching him draw. It had been a bit awkward at first, and he still didn't really know what to think of it.

Steve knew that he could never love anyone the way that he had loved Peggy. Their romance had been strange, and strong, and tragic and beautiful. But maybe, if he did meet the right person, he could love someone again. In a different way. But it was stupid to even think of something like that right now, even if Hill felt- well, any emotions ever, mainly any towards him, now was the worst time to think about anything like this. He had to focus on getting Barton back to Natasha.

They were now about an hour from their final destination, when Tony suddenly stood up, and yelled out in alarm. "Guys! Guys! We have company!" The entire team was instantly alert, Thor called his hammer to his hand, pieces of armor started flying from around the plane, onto Tony's body. Steve had his shield in hand, Banner simply began gathering his important files and papers together into a backpack. If something was about to happen, he wanted to be prepared.

"Stark, what do you mean? Explain." Steve ordered tensely, Tony was walking towards the door to the cockpit. "Just did a scan of the area, we have two planes honing in on us. Looks like they're fitted with guns, possibly some other weapons I didn't get. They're headed this way, best to assume the worst." Tony turned to Bruce, "Banner, what's your call? You going to Hulk up, or stay as is?" For a few agonizing seconds they waited impatiently for his answer, he was still cramming things into his backpack. "Uh, um, we aren't sure that they are going to attack us. But if they fly by and the other guy attacks them, we'd definitely be in trouble. If it'll help I will see what I can do, but for now let's not jump to conclusions."

Tony rolled his eyes a bit, though Banner's logic did make sense. He entered the cockpit to tell the pilots what was up. Meanwhile Steve headed to a pile of different sized bags and backpacks. He grabbed six survival packs, jumping to the worst case scenario that they might have to leave the plane. He slung one onto his back, making sure to leave room for a parachute. He then just stared at the remaining bags, wondering how to do this. Tony couldn't fly with one of these on, if Banner became the Hulk, his bag would go flying. He supposed the two pilots could wear their own, if they fit over their parachutes. Maybe... "Thor!" Steve called the Demigod over, the plane took a steep banking turn, he hardly caught his balance. Thor came over, and after Steve explained, allowed the remaining bags to be slung on and attached to him. One was left, Steve put that one over his should with the first. The plane was dipping and swerving wildly, he reached for a parachute- and then everything exploded.

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WHOA CLIFF HANGER!


	13. Chapter 13

Everything exploded. One second Steve was standing on solid ground, then there was nothing but fire and flying metal, and falling. For seconds Steve had to adjust to the fall, thank goodness he had so much experience parachuting into places. Otherwise he probably wouldn't be able to think, or process what was happening at all. Once he got over the initial terror, Steve had the good sense to position his body in a spread eagle position- he had learned from experience that this could help slow his fall. Wind whipped in his ears, hunks of flying metal fell down around him.

The Captains eyes were streaming in the freezing wind, his ears popping from the altitude. It was hard to breathe, at this height the oxygen was thin and weak. Struggling, Steve opened his eyes and looked down at his surroundings. There was nothing but the color white. Every single thing he could see below him, was consumed by snow. He didn't see any of his team around him- shouldn't someone be saving him by now? What was happening? Was he about to die? Maybe he could land on a giant mountain of snow. No, that was stupid. As stupid as hoping a flying man with a hammer might catch him? Oh god, he was going to die if no one saved him soon.

The ground was swiftly zooming up to meet him, Steve was starting to panic. He couldn't even shout for help, couldn't breathe He could think though. Images flashed through his mind. Memories from his childhood, Peggy, the War. Fighting. New York. He was going to die, why was no one catching him? He was less than a thousand feet away from the ground below him now, he was going to die.

Suddenly, an invisible force slammed hard into Steve, he was abruptly flying, swiftly moving sideways through the air. Still in shock and thinking he was falling, he tried to grab onto whatever was holding him, but couldn't get a grip. Something strong, and unyielding and cold was wrapped around Steve's waist, and he was still falling quickly, but this was a controlled fall. Either this was some kind of miracle, or there was only one other explanation.

He couldn't even move his head, his limbs were locked in terror. But Steve managed to open his mouth, to yell out. "STARK! IS THAT YOU?" An irritated voice came from a few feet above Steve, "No, Rogers, this is God! Of course it's me! Who the hell else would it be? Who else would save your worthless butt when you are falling out of a plane?"

They were almost to the ground now, Steve looked up, the reflective stealth mode of Tony's suit reflected his own face back to the super soldier. But looking around the reflective suit, Cap could see the bulk of the flaming plane was still falling. Three good sized jets were circling high above them, this far away Steve couldn't see any weapons on them. But he obviously knew they must be there. He couldn't see the other Avengers, or the two pilots either. He just hoped they were ok...

Without any warning, Steve was falling again. But this time he was only roughly twenty five feet off the ground, a feasible drop for a super soldier. Steve fell through the tops of a few trees, bounced against some branches. Landed in a snowbank, and crouched on the ground still a bit stunned that he was alive. Starks voice came from above him, "Stay here! Maybe hide under something, until those planes go away. Just stay out of sight. I'll be back. I already dumped Banner- uh somewhere. Gotta go find him. I mean GET him." Steve couldn't see Tony when he wore this new suit, that practically made him invisible. But he knew when Iron Man was gone.

Steve hated hiding among the trees and bushes, he felt like a trapped rabbit. But he wasn't an idiot, he didn't want to be seen. Right now stealth was the teams best option. So the Super Soldier found a solid clump of bushes nearby, cleared some branches away, and made a very unsecure, very temporary hiding place. He had no idea how long he would be waiting here, or who would be coming back. Steve realized he still had the emergency bags slung over his back, a lot of good they had been when he was falling out of an airplane. Expecting a lengthy wait, he decided to take an inventory of what the bags had.

But no sooner had he opened one, then something large and silver, and red and blonde landed heavily close by. Thor had one of the planes pilots over each arm, and, Steve noted, the rest of the survival bags still on his back. That was impressive. The two men who had been flying the plane looked duly traumatized, one of them took a few wobbly steps when Thor released him, then collapsed unconscious. The other's knees crumpled, and he dragged himself to rest under a tree, where he lay in a stunned daze. Thor glanced around the area, whispering in his shouting way. "Captain Steve! Where are you? It is safe to come out! Stark said that you would be here!"

Steve came out, cautiously looking up at the sky. Through the branches he only saw one of the enemy planes flying sporadically overhead. He wondered if it knew they were here in this spot. He wondered where the other two planes were. "Thor, you ok? Are these two ok?" The demigod walked forward, relief on his face. "I am fine, and I managed to save these two, before they suffered too many injuries. I am relieved to see you in good health though- when neither Tony or I could quickly grab you, I feared you were not long for this world. I do apologize for not saving you, but the circumstances were not favorable for that to happen.

Steve waved it off- "No, no, it's fine. It worked out, I'm sure you did your best. What did you say about these two being hurt?" Steve walked to the man who had fainted, asking Thor to help out the other. Ok, this pilot didn't look too bad. Obviously traumatized, a few cuts on his face, and a pretty nasty burn on the leg. The cloth of the mans pants leg had burnt away, the skin was a fierce shade of red. But he'd live. "That guy ok Thor?" Apparently used to injuries in the field, Thor had swiftly examined the pilot and found nothing too troubling. "A few surface wounds, a nasty cut above the eye, and a burn the size of a ravens egg on his neck. But this man shall be fine, with some simple care.I believe we rescued them from the burning airplane before too much damage could harm them"

The two Avengers dragged the pilots back underneath Steve's clump of bushes, clearing what snow they could off the ground, laying them side by side. Thor continued clearing away more snow, though the frozen earth beneath probably wasn't much warmer once the frost was cleared. Meanwhile Steve again went to see what exactly was in one of the survival bags.

Inside of one, he found quite a number of pleasant surprises- Clearly Shield had a very good understanding of what a fallen soldier in the field would need. A survival blanket, water purification tablets, an extensive first aid kit, a fire starter, a dozen dehydrated meals, a medium sized knife, and maybe best of all a gun with five rounds of bullets. There was also a bulky yet high tech cellphone, but not sure of its signal could alert others to their presence, Steve ignored it for now. He opened the other bags, only to find they all held the same supplies. Not a bad haul all in all.

Fifteen minutes later Thor and Steve had fixed up the two pilots. Their burns and cuts were bandaged, and both were now conscious. Thor was speaking with the still fairly traumatized men, and Steve was gathering up clean snow, hoping to somehow melt it without starting a fire. When suddenly, Banner came crashing through the bushes, an invisible Stark clearly holding him. Unless Bruce had somehow learned how to levitate. Both men dropped to the ground, and Tony turned off the stealth mode of his suit. Bruce was still clutching his backpack, and he stumbled to a patch of ground clear of snow, and sat down heavily. Tony meanwhile started talking rapidly, before anyone could ask any questions.

"Everyone here? All alive? Great. I wasn't able to ping the planes, otherwise they could have tracked the signal back to my location. They had some kind of logo on them, but I couldn't get a clear look at it. Even if I could've seen it, it might've been a fake. After the explosion I managed to grab Banner before he turned all Hulky on us. Lucky I did, or there is no way we wouldn't be seen by now. He has a bunch of information and files that are pretty much useless to us now. Anyone have something useful?"

Steve and Thor showed Tony the emergency packs, and that cheered him up slightly. It was definitely better than nothing. Soon Bruce had collected himself, and the two pilots (Named Joss and Stanley) were ok. Shaken, but ok. After they decided it would be foolish to go anywhere when it was getting dark, Stark used the hand beams on his suit to blast a good portion of snow away. Soon all the men where eating the disgusting freeze dried meals (dehydrated with melted snow), and those who needed them, were wrapped in the survival blankets. So pretty much everyone but Thor and Steve.

Everyone was quiet as they ate what the bag said was beef stew, but tasted more like puréed hotdogs with some random chewy bits thrown in. Their eyes were glued to the sky, watching for the planes to come back. Finally, Tony threw his half eaten pouch of food down in disgust. "Ok, that's it. If I eat one more bite of that garbage, it's all going to come back up. Are we just going to freeze to death here, or discuss a plan for tomorrow? Are we continuing the mission, calling reinforcements, giving up like a bunch of babies?" Steve was used to bad food in the army, but even he could hardly swallow the mushy "stew". He threw his own pouch by Tonys. "I don't know. I think we ARE the people called in when reinforcements are needed. If we need help,its pretty much the end of the line. And I am not giving up. Natasha doesn't have time for this! As far as we know she could be DEAD by now!"

This angry statement made everyone fall silent again. No one said a word, or even looked at the others. It was Thor who finally spoke up. "We were not far from our destination when we were attacked, correct? With some hard walking tomorrow morning, we should get to Barton. Or at least the place we suspect he is located. I think we should rest tonight, and head towards our original landing point tomorrow." The Avengers team reluctantly agreed to this plan, when one of the pilots spoke up. "Um, do you mind if Stan and I wait here? We just fly the plane really... We don't have any fighting experience. Maybe we could start heading to the closest village tomorrow?" Tony rolled his eyes at this, but Steve assured the two they would not have to fight. They all discussed what directions the men would have to head, and Stan gave Tony the coordinates of where they believed Clint was. There was really nothing they could do now, except wait for tomorrow.


	14. Chapter 14

The next morning, no one was happy. Steve had hardly gotten any sleep, waking every half hour or so, ever on guard. Not at all used to a lack of luxury, the second Tony woke up he was complaining about the cold, the ground, his hunger for a food that wasn't goop, it was best for everyone to just tune him out. Thor was anxious for the day (and the battle) to begin, and Banner was filled with unease. He knew he might have to give in to becoming the other guy today, and no matter what, he never could feel good about that.

Joss and Stan were the only ones NOT in bad moods. They were both eager to get going, hardly seeming to be worried about the long trek before them. Over breakfast (if you could call it that) everyone pored over a map that Bruce had, and it was decided the closest town would be roughly a day away for the two men. There they would contact Shield, and it was decided if the team was not heard from within two days, reinforcements would be sent in.

So the two pilots left, each with a survival bag slung over their backs, eager to go as far as possible before nightfall. Finally alone, it was time for the Avengers to make a plan. No one felt like sitting in the freezing snow, or muddy ground. Instead they just stood around, except Tony. He was already in his (apparently heated) suit. Steve was the first to speak. "So, ok. What do we know? Bruce, how much information do we have?" The scientist still had his papers and files, he took a second to gather them, and his thoughts together. "Ok. We know the plane was headed to a place where we thought Clint might be, and we were are almost certain that a hostile force of shield might be there. Since our plane was the victim of an unprovoked attack, it's pretty much confirmed out suspicions were correct. But just because we know an enemy of shield is in the vicinity, we don't know that they have Barton. Or who they are. Or why they would track us, or want him- Basically all we know is that we are now on enemy ground. But at least now we know that we might be in the right place, so I think we have to form a plan and head towards Bartons coordinates."

Tony clapped his hands, some sparks flew from them by accident, landing on the edge of Thor's cape. The Demigod scowled and stomped them out quickly. "Oops, sorry Pointbreak. I gotta work on fixing that... Anyway, it sounds like this should be an easy mission! I can fly over in stealth mode, to locate the facility. Once we find it, we fly in, smash the hell out of the place, and get Barton! Bam! Easy! Should we go now?" Everyone was quiet, and staring at him in disbelief. "What? It's a good plan! Then maybe we can go home, and I can get some real food." Steve rolled his eyes, and Banner spoke up. "Uh, ha, yeah smashing a place to bits isn't really a plan. We need to think this out, calculate all the facts. Decide the-" Tony interrupted. "BORING! Listen, how about golden boy and I fly up to find the place, then we can pick you two up. Sound good?" Before anyone could speak, Tony was invisible and the sound of him flying rose above everyone's heads. Thor glanced at Cap and Bruce, when they didn't say anything, he began swinging his hammer, and took off after Tony.

Steve and Bruce were alone.

Banner sighed, and pushed his glasses up on his nose. "Uh, ok. Should we, I guess head in the direction where we think the place is? Then if Tony or Thor find it, when they come get us we won't have to fly as far? I think moving around is preferable to waiting around and freezing to death." Steve couldn't argue with this, and agreed to start walking. They had jobs to do first though. They had to find places to hide all the supply bags they would not carry, and something had to be done with Banners papers. If the team were to get caught, they didn't want this information to fall into enemy hands. It was quite a blow, but the information was skimmed over one last time, and then carefully burnt. They had to make sure the flames didn't create noticeable smoke, anything left over had to be destroyed a second time. But finally, they were on there way.

"Banner, I've been thinking about something." Steve spoke, they had been walking roughly half an hour. "Does all of this seem maybe a bit too easy to you? We managed to find Clint, those planes never came back to search for us, no one even got seriously hurt in the crash. Does it seem something might be up?" Bruce frowned, but admitted he had been thinking along the same lines. "The thought did cross my mind. It is almost a bit too easy. Maybe we will arrive, and things will be crazily hard. But it does seem odd that no one found us last night. I also had to wonder about finding Barton. It's almost like- they wanted us to find this place."

The men were quiet, as they trekked through the snow. Steve was lost in thought. If they (whoever THEY were) wanted to be found, they'd be ready for whoever arrived. Maybe- maybe even ready for the Avengers. What would the enemy expect? Probably a blatant attack, basically the plan Stark had mapped out that morning. Anyone would be expecting that. But that was fine right? They had killed an alien army, surely they could break a man out of an enemy facility. But they didn't even know anything about this place, wasn't it a bit of a wasted opportunity to (probably) destroy the entire place without getting any information on it?

"Banner," Steve said. "I think we need to work on a new plan..."

They had been walking for almost seven hours, when the sound of something thudding to the ground put the two on alert. Steve had his shield in hand, Bruce- Well, his eyes skimmed the area, probably determining if he would have to hulk out. Steve was cursing himself for not having one of the guns within easier reach, instead of in the bag, when a familiar voice spoke. "Oh calm down pansies, it's just me. A giant monster isn't about to eat you." Tony's suit was visible again, he was standing a few yards away from them. "And, I have good news- Goldilocks and I found the base. Big building, camouflaged pretty damn well too! Blends right in with all this horrible white stuff. It's an hour flight away, should we go now?" Steve and Bruce glanced at each other, wondering who should be the one to tell Tony his plan was stupid and would probably result in disaster. Steve cracked. "Stark, we are not going to just barge in and start smashing stuff up. We don't know enough about this place yet, we need to make an actual plan." Tony turned red. "Oh, sorry I was the only one to come up with a plan this morning when everyone else was just sitting around eating bags of glop!" "No," Cap interrupted. You were the first one to verbalize an idea, then you just flew off!" Tony opened his mouth to argue this, but realized he couldn't. "Fine ice-cube, do you have a plan?" Steve opened his mouth to start talking, Ton lifted his hand and rolled his eyes. " That was sarcasm Steve, of course Captain freaking America has a plan... It's like, in your DNA or something... Ok, start giving us the mundane details of your plan." Steve smirked. "This isn't my plan Stark, just a few parts of it are." Banner stepped into the conversation. "The bulk of this idea is actually mine."

A smirk grew on Tony's face. "Well, this should be a lot more interesting then."


	15. Chapter 15

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Aaaand in between the last chapter and this one, I went on a big ol trip to China for five months. No big deal. But I did not write anything for my fanfics in that time, so if my writing style or the flow of this story seems a bit different, that is why. Also, you know what does not take any time and makes people happy? LEAVING A REVIEW!!!!

Being woken up with a bucket of ice cold water was not Clint Barton's favorite way to wake up, but it still wasn't his least favorite. He preferred it to being woken with fire. Or a bullet. Or the sensation of a knife cutting into him. Instantly wide awake, Clint lurched violently against the chains bounding him to the chair, gasping for a breathe of air, shaking the water out of his eyes. Eyes darting around the room, he took in his surroundings. Nothing much had changed since he was brought here two days ago. A dying lightbulb lit the middle of the room before the edges faded into darkness. It was also really cold in here. Really cold. Not so cold that Barton thought he might be in, lets say, Antarctic. He would have to guess he was in Alaska, maybe a handful of locations in America. Not that he had very much to go off of other than the weather, for all he knew he might be in the middle of the desert, and this cold was being manufactured in this room to further confuse him. And with no information or human contact since he got here, Clint was reasonably confused.

He knew the drill. He had been left alone, deprived of food and water, physically weakened. Mentally filled with the anguish of uncertainty of what would come next. Every part of him had been as weakened as it could in a two day period.

So now it was time for the torture to start.

The strange man put the empty bucket down besides the door, folded his hands behind his back, and spent a moment staring at Hawkeye. Clint began collecting what information he could from his captives appearance. He looked to be in his late forties, dressed casually in a very expensive outfit. He moved one hand to his side as if he expected to grab hold of something that wasn't there. Maybe a cellphone. Maybe a gun. Clint wished Nat was here, not just because it would be nice to have his partner by his side when he fought his way out. She was the one who could look at a man and see everything about him, learn how he ticked and use that information against him. Clint was the one who took the information she got about their victims, and used it to better take them down. Now he was on his own- But that was fine, it wasn't the first time he would have to escape confinement on his own. Heck, it wasn't even the first time this year! But, always, every time he had to fight alone, he wished she was at his side. Wasn't that twisted of him? When he was in the most danger was when he missed her the most. He shouldn't wish she was here being held prisoner beside him, but she did.

And she wasn't, for now she was on his own. So he had to see more about this situation, lean what he could. What would Tash see? The man and Clint stared at each other for a moment, Barton tried to think like Tasha, see what she would see. And- All he got was the fact that this man was holding him captive. Thats it. He couldn't see anything that would help him. The man began speaking-

"Agent Barton, it's a pleasure to officially meet you. My employer is an immense fan of yours, well, actually, a fan of the Avengers. Not so much of you. He is more of a Hulk fan, something about all that uncontrollable rage appeals to him." The mans voice was oily, as if his words were squeezed from his throat and then spilled out over his lips. "I am sorry we had to take you in the way we did- But lets not fool ourselves, you never would have come willingly. So we had to fight, and we got you. But now I have eight men who are never going to come back because of you, and who knows, a few in the hospital might not either." At these words, the man walked up close to Clint, paused a foot away from his chair. "Of course, none of this means anything to me. Those soldiers were simply a sacrifice for the greater good, in the end all will work out as planned. The cost of a few lives is nothing to us in the big picture."

Clint's stomach churned at these words. He had been under attack, maybe some of those men deserved to die, if he hadn't killed them- well, he would be where here anyway. He felt some guilt over these new deaths he could add to his list. And felt more when he heard this man speak of human life as if it was something that could be disposed of like a piece of garbage. Clint discreetly licked some off the water from around his mouth- He was so thirsty. His lips cracked when he spoke. "What is it, that you want from me. Why am I here."

The mystery man leaned in closer to Clint, then as if retaining this took a few steps back. "You, Agent Barton, are here because we want the Avengers. And now because of you we are going to get them. And we are going to kill every last one of them.


	16. Chapter 16

The team was ready to go in and get Clint back. They had formed a new plan, that had been thought out better than the first one. Though since Tony had helped with parts, it was still more than a bit risky. Better than nothing though.

Steve, Thor and Bruce were waiting in the bushes, a couple hundred feet from the base. They were waiting for the signal from Tony, hoping it would be the one that said they should go in, the coast was clear. Not the distress sign requesting immediate backup. The plan was that Tony would get into the base first, since he was the only one who could do it without being he would figure out a way to open the gates, and kill the security cameras. He had tweaked his knockout ray with a swiss army knife, and planned on using that if he ran into too many guards. He hadn't figured out the ray that would wake people up, but honestly that wasn't a big problem right now. The real issue was that he wasn't sure how long the ray would last, the battery life was iffy. Everyone just had to hope that Tony could stay undercover, and wouldn't have to worry about fighting an entire army from a secret base alone.

He had flown off a couple minutes ago, the other three men were tensely waiting, going over a few more details they wanted to be clear on. But quietly. One of the signals was quieter than the other, they wanted to make sure they could pick up on it. If everything went down though, Tony was just going to blow something up, if they heard an explosion they were supposed to come. It was quiet, now none of them were talking. Suddenly Thor said, "Wait, is that it?" Steve listened. Off in the distance, they heard the screechy sound of feedback. Bruce grinned, " Perfect, Tony managed to hack the sound system. Let's roll."

They all ran towards the base, the feedback noise stopped, and soon they were in front of the gate. Steve looked around nervously, feeling extremely exposed waiting out in the open like this. "Stark!" Bruce hissed, "are you here? Hurry up!" The gates opened, and the team ran in. Tony met them, and gave them what information he had. "I took down enough guards to rig the radio and kill the cameras without being found out, but we only have a few minutes before our cover is blown. I would guess soldiers are coming now to check out the gate, and once one of us is found, all hell will break lose. I couldn't pin Barton's exact location, but know he is in that building, first floor. Let's move it, and get this done!"

Tony thrust a bundle of clothes to Steve, the team quickly moved to put their plan into action. Tony would run distractions, with some help from Thor, who would be using lightning to incapacitate parts of the fence, and protect Banner until he might be needed as the Hulk. Meanwhile, Steve was going to wear the uniform of one of the soldiers and look for Clint. Everyone had to admit it was the best plan they could come up with right now, though Tony had complained it didn't have more explosions. Everything had been timed, so that if something went wrong the emergency plan could be launched.

The other avengers ran off, and soon Steve was wearing his disguise. The only problem was that he didn't have any way to hide his shield. And he couldn't leave it behind, it was his best weapon. He figured he would just move quickly, and incapacitate anyone who happened to notice the iconic weapon. That didn't take very long. He was walking towards the building that apparently held Clint, doing his best to look normal. A rather impossible feat when the shield was on his person. It practically screamed, "I don't belong here! Come and get me bad guys!" And sure enough, a group of soldiers walked around the corner of a building. And saw Steve. And as Tony had predicted, all hell broke loose.

They began yelling into walkie talkies, Steve lifted his shield just in time, and multiple bullets pinged off of it. He rolled forwards, and whacked one of the men on his legs, causing him to fall down. Steve threw his shield, to knock down another man, and grabbed a gun from the first man he had felled. He shot a couple of them in the leg, and knocked the rest of the men unconscious. He looked around to make sure no one else had seen,

but he knew the sounds of the gun meant someone would definitely be here soon. He bolted towards the building Tony said Clint was being held in.

Steve was sweating, and swearing in his head. An alarm started blaring, he kicked open the door and threw his shield at the solitary soldier standing guard behind it. He didn't have a lot of time, now that people knew the team as here, it wouldn't be hard to guess who they were here for. And if Clint had just been bait to get them here? Of they would rather he died than get away? Well, it would be far too easy to kill him before any of the Avengers could save him.

Steve grabbed a key card from the belt of the unconscious soldier and hoped it was high enough clearance to get into Clint's cell. He opened the first door, and felt overwhelmed as he realized he had no idea where to go. He felt like an idiot for not asking a single one of the soldiers where Clint was, before knocking them out…..He saw a group of men running down the hallway, he decided he should follow them. If worse came to worse he could, well, "interrogate" one of them until he learned where Clint was.

But he wouldn't have to do that, luck was in his favor today. The soldiers ran for maybe ten minutes, they were unorganized and panicked, and didn't even notice the stranger following them. They got to a door with a lock, and two keypads on it. One of the men opened the door, and when they entered- there was CIint.

He really didn't look good. His face was bloody, he had cuts all over him, and what looked like a half dozen burns. He wasn't moving, for a second Steve was scared his friend was dead. But then the man who had unlocked the door pulled his gun out. He told the rest of the men, "We have to kill him. Directors orders. The rest of the team is here, we don't need him anymore." Before the man could say another word, Steve had knocked him out. The next couple minutes were rough, but soon Steve stood with piles of soldiers lying around him. Clint was also unconscious, but he stirred when Steve began untying the ropes binding him to the chair. One of the cuts on his forehead was bleeding freely, he mumbled something quietly. Steve leaned closer to hear, telling him, "It's ok Clint. We're here, we'll get you out of here. It's going to be ok." This time when Clint spoke, Steve could hear two words. "Black Widow….."

Steve remembered when Natasha had been hurt, on the verge of dying. But she still knew she was in the field, and names were dangerous. And she had called for Hawkeye. Not Clint. And now here he was, calling for the Black Widow. It was like they were two sides of the same coin, so similar. So connected. Steve just hoped Clint wasn't dying, like his partner might be…..

He threw the man over his shoulder, and turned towards the door. And found he wasn't alone anymore.


	17. Chapter 17

Tony was standing in the door, without saying a word he gestured for Steve to follow him, and left the room. He yelled behind him, "Cap, we have to move. It's a trap, they wanted us in one place. Damn it! We are such idiots!" Without question, Steve followed Stark out the door. More than a few people would love nothing more than to see had come to this team. They'd love to see them fail, die, be utterly destroyed. Then there were the nut jobs who wanted nothing more than to capture the team. So they could research, study them, take them apart and put them back together. Of course a few thousand weirdo fans would also like to have the Avengers held captive for their own convenience. They had gotten some crazy and creepy fanmail before. But those people were not much of a threat. But this situation? Right now what was happening? This was a threat. This was bad.

"Do they know the current situation?" Steve asked Tony, they were jogging down the hallways now, hopefully Stark knew where to go because he hardly did. "I alerted Banner the time line had been bumped up, that they shouldn't do anything stupid if we don't get there in time. "Meaning I am sure they absolutely will do something stupid if we don't get there in time." "Well let's hope so, otherwise we're screwed." The two were interrupted by a small squadron of soldiers, but Tony soon took care of them. He beamed a laser, soon unconscious men were strewn across the floor. Steve had some questions about this, but knew they didn't have time. He just hoped the men were sleeping and not dead…

"We're almost out!" Tony assured Steve. We just changed our plans so we would exit this way, so that then it would work if we got delayed and had to-" Then Tony was flying through the air, body convulsing, until he crashed, colliding hard with the unforgiving floor. Wisps of electricity scurried around his edges, crackling along the rims of his suit. Acting on instinct Steve dumped Clint down, leaning the poor archer against a wall. That simple act cost him precious seconds. By the time he had turned around, reaching for his shield, he was out of time. Soldiers were everywhere, dozens of guns were pointing at the team. Tony was groaning, still on the floor, when he tried to get up Steve saw what had incapacitated the man in the first place. As Tony got into a kneeling position, lifting an arm to shoot off a beam, a stream of white electricity surged from a tile of the wall, hitting him in the side.

With the enemy surrounding him, his team helpless, Steve had no choice. He dropped his shield at his feet, lifted his hands above his head. The enemy men warily circled three of earths mightiest heroes, unsure what to do next. Steve could only hope this scenario had been included in the plan, that this was what Tony meant by "being delayed." If not, he had to hope he could find a way to get the three of them out of this. One of the walls of soldiers was shifting, as something moved forcefully through them. A man made his way through, wearing an expensive suit, and a smug look on his face. "Well I have half of you here now, not bad not bad. Should be enough to get the rest of you weirdos. My employer will be quite pleased, quite pleased. He DOES look forward to meeting you!"

The next few minutes were spent listening to the typical evil villain speech. Honestly, why did they always explain their plan as soon as they captured their victims? It was beyond idiotic of them. The speech lasted roughly eight minutes, the details were so redundant, they had already captured and taken down a half dozen other villains with practically the same plan. Get ahold of one of the team, or someone they cared about. Use them as bait to lure in the rest of the team. Capture the entire team and do whatever they wanted with them. It was a boring predictable unimaginative plan.

Unfortunately, this was the first time any of these plans had worked to this extent.  
It was stupid really, Steve felt like he was living a crummy saturday morning cartoon.

Now apparently they were going to be taken to their cells. The man was ordering some of the men to continue searching for the rest of the team. Soldiers were surrounding the three avengers, preparing to move them, and for the first time Tony looked decidedly nervous. Steve kept looking at him, looking for a signal of what he should do next. Tony had seemed to know what he was doing just now, and had been the man with the plan. Sure enough, now that the attention of their captors was diverted, Tony was mouthing the words, "More time. More time! Stall!"

Steve didn't know what to do. Endanger all of their lives by doing something stupid? Make a rash decision that would not help, that he would then regret? Turns out he didn't have to do that, because of course he was with Iron Man. Tony was still in his suit, and apparently the electricity had not totally shorted everything out in it. The next few minutes were insane chaos, Tony was firing at anything that moved, half the soldiers were in the way of the beam that had first got Tony, all of them were now convulsing on the floor. It was futile, with Steve focusing on guarding Clint, and Tony's suit far from full power, there was no way they could win. But this wasn't about winning, it was about stalling for time.

More soldiers came out of nowhere, shots were fired in the air, before long Steve was being held at gunpoint, and Tony was being dragged towards the direction of the electrical gun that had done so much damage. The stereotypical villain looked furious, and was yelling to be heard over the din of the fight. "That's it! Let's give you a taste of the Zapp again!" He looked as if he expected Stark to quake with fear, but all he did was raise an eyebrow. "Seriously? You, you made this giant electricity gun that got ME down, and you name it the Zapp? You really need to hire some goonies who can come up with a better weapon name." The villain actually looked hurt over this for a minute, like Tony had hurt his feelings. "Well, I had enough goonies to warn me overexposure to the zapper could burn a few brain cells. I really shouldn't expose you to it again Mr. Stark, but I think you have more than a few to spare."

Before anyone could move, a forceful whirlwind of power crashed through the wall, suddenly everything was noise, and electricity, and lightning, and green. A lot of this was green. Steve dived for his shield, and knocked out a few soldiers so that he could obtain a weapon. Then, all he could focus on was getting to Clint, protecting him from the battle suddenly raging around them. It did not last long, a Hulk tends to make quick work of any fight. When the sound of battle had quieted, Steve came out from behind the shield he has been covering Clint and himself with. He saw Thor helping up Tony, the bloody smear that had been their wanna be captive, men running in the distance down the hallway, and the mass of green filling the space. The Hulk grinned down at Steve, and rumbled his signature line as if it was a joke. "Hulk Smash."


	18. Chapter 18

Maria Hill paced back and forth in her office, wishing that anything would happen so she'd have something to do. Most of the time when the team assembled it was for something so dangerous and potentially world destroying, that she had more than enough work to keep her mind off of whatever the team was doing. But this was just a find and rescue mission….. One where Barton could be dead, the team injured. What if one of the nut job geniuses of the world had figured out a way to capture or kill the team? She wished there was more work for her to do right now that would keep her busy, like there was on most of the Avengers jobs. But the mission they were on now was personal. It did not hold the survival of the world in the balance, or millions of lives. Instead the lives of two of the worlds top assassins were what the team was fighting for. The world that two people had built together, around each other. If this mission failed it probably wouldn't even make it to the front page of the newspaper. But no matter the outcome, Maria knew this mission would stay with each member of the team forever.

She could only hope it would turn out well.

The problem remained, that this mission was not important to the world, and that meant business at Shield was running along as usual. Agent Hill had burnt through all the paperwork she could find, run a tour for new Shield recruits, and was currently overseeing several minor missions. She still somehow had free time on her hands. Time to worry. She knew the teams plane had gone down under enemy fire, because they had made contact with the two pilots. Agents had been sent to the general location of those two men, and hopefully the plan to extract the rest of the team would be successfully carried out this afternoon. Still, it would be hours until she even knew if they had made it to the meeting point.  
She had to do something to distract herself. Maybe she would check on Natasha again. She left her office, and began walking towards the ICU of the hospital wing.

Natasha's condition had not changed much in the last couple of days. There had been a couple scares, where it seemed she was getting worse, but luckily they had been able to stabilize her. When she finally got to the spy's room, she looked the same as she had since she got here. Sure some cuts and scrapes were starting to heal, but other than that, Natasha still looked horrible. Pale, still, tubes and wires snaking around her. It hurt Maria to see the woman she had worked with for so many years injured and dying. At least the pain of seeing Natasha like this distracted her from wondering if Steve- and the rest of the team, was alive. A doctor came into the observation room to speak with the agent. "Hill, we told you we'd contact you if anything changed in Agent Romanoffs condition. She is the same as she was last night. Her brain activity is spiking, blood pressure is stable, heart rate is-" Suddenly a loud screeching beeping came from the room. Doctors were running around, talking urgently, yelling out for tools. "What is it? What's going on?" Maria asked anxiously, but the doctor ignored her and ran into the other room.

Maria was stuck, standing, watching, waiting. Yet another time that she was standing here on the sidelines, waiting to learn if a friend will live or die, helpless to do anything. All she could do, was hope for the best. And she knew from the past, that far too often, hope just wasn't enough to help someone.

They were maybe three fourths of the way back to the hellicarrier, and with it flying towards their direction to meet them, they would probably arrive before nightfall. The Avengers were riding a small speedy little plane, well, one small enough to equip a fully stocked medical room. A team of specialists were buzzing around Clint, and after some time of the entire team standing outside the room, they had been told they should go try and sleep. Agent Barton would be fine. Yes he had been tortured, but they all had to admit that was hardly a new experience for the man,

Luckily, everything had gone perfectly for the pick up of the team. With the help of Thor and the Hulk, they had made quick work of the journey to the location they had agreed to meet shield at. Hulk had carried Steve and Tony (in his broken suit), and Thor had taken care of Clint. As soon as they got to plane, Clint had been taken by a small team of doctors. They learned that the archer had a concussion, cracked jaw, half a dozen knife wounds, an acid burn, and to top it all off lacerations covering his limbs, with a healthy mix of bruises scrapes and lumps. It wasn't pleasant of course, but he would live.

Now the plane was quiet, Barton was sleeping with the help of some drugs that had calmed him down for medical care. Thor and Bruce were both sleeping, sprawled out in a couple of chairs. But Steve was still awake, keeping an eye on things. He was tense and high strung from the aftermath of battle, and stress about Natasha. No one had been able to give him any real news about her condition, except to confirm she was indeed still alive. And then when he had asked to contact Maria Hill, he had been told all contact with Shield was forbidden until they were certain they were out of enemy territory, and out of range of having their signals picked up by that same enemy. Steve had argued that they had left the base almost completely demolished, but he had been ignored.

So he was sitting here, hoping. Hoping Clint would really be ok, that Natasha was alive, that their plane was not being followed by an enemy or about to be blown up, hoping everything would work out ok. He was sitting in the dimly lit plane, wondering if turning on a light or lifting a window shade would wake one of his teammates. Suddenly someone plopped down into the seat next to him.

"Someone sitting here Cap? Oh, wait, yup, I am." Steve closed his eyes in irritation. "Stark. How are you doing?" Tony put his feet up on the chair across from him, and pulled a bag of baby carrots out of a pocket. "Oh, you know, I've been better. I will always prefer to NOT get zapped by a giant electric beam of super death, and the suit took quite a beating. Might have to lay poor Mark 53 to rest. Have a funeral for him when I get back. Or I could dissect him and reuse his parts in the name of science…. Haven't decided yet." As Tony bit into a carrot, Steve clenched his fists. With Natasha possibly on the verge of death for all he knew, he really didn't appreciate jokes about funerals.

Oblivious to the annoyed silence, Tony continued talking. "Well then, sure was fun going on a little field trip with the team. It was like a team building exercise, missed with a horrible vacation, right? Next time I'll plan the team trip.I'm thinking we could go somewhere tropical. Or snowy. Hey, what if we went to Budapest to force Mr. and Mrs. "We are killer spys and absolutely not a couple" to tell us what happened in Budapest? That would rock…. Yeah, I should do that….." Steve would have loved to stand up and walk away, maybe ask someone how Clint was doing. But he was in the window seat, and Stark was blocking his way to the aisle. He stood up, and looked down at Tony.

"Could you move? I'm going to check on Barton." Tony kept his feet up, blocking Steve's path. "What's wrong Cap? I just thought I'd try and have a civil conversation with you. Try and get to know ya better." He smirked at the man towering over him. Steve scowled. "Well I am sorry about your suit, but I don't exactly feel like joking about funerals when one of my teammates could be dying, and the other has been tortured. Now please move so I can get by." Tony almost looked hurt as he lowered his feet, allowing Steve to pass. "I didn't mean it like that. Sorry, I wasn't thinking." Captain America frowned. "Well maybe you should start thinking. I don't joke about death when my friend is dying. It's time you took this seriously, and pretended you cared a little bit."

Tony snorted, and stood up. "Do you know what Rogers? You need to stop this thing you have going, where you are the poor victim who let Spider get hurt, and where you are the only one who cares about her. We all care about her. We have all fought with her, and we all care about her. Or else we wouldn't be here. Heck, I was working with her back when you were a little baby icicle frozen in your airplane. You need to stop the poor me act. This is not all your fault, and you are not the only one who cares for her. She terrifies me, and I know she could kill me 50 different ways with a pen. But I like her, and don't want her to die. And if she does die, I am glad we are giving her and bird man to say goodbye.

Steve and Tony stared at each other for a long moment, then Tony walked away in a foul mood. Steve slumped back down in his seat, and thought about what Tony had said. It was true, he hadn't stopped blaming himself since this happened. And he had presumed that of the entire team he was the one with the strongest connection to Nat. That had been stupid. They were a team, they were all connected to each other. He needed to rethink how he had handled this whole situation. And how he had led his team.

About an hour later, one of the agents walked up to Steve and began speaking. "Captain, we are approaching the hellicarrier, and the doctors have told me Agent Barton is stable. They wanted me to tell you it might be a good idea if someone from the team was there to wake him up, and tell him the situation. Steve stood, and wondered who he should bring with him. After some thought, he woke up Banner- and then got Stark. He didn't think it would be a good idea if Thor helped explain what was going on to Barton, but maybe it would be best if at least most of the team explained what had happened.


	19. Chapter 19

Maria closed her laptop with a snap, and bolted for the door. They were here. They were all alive, more importantly Natasha was still alive and ready to be operated on, Steve- the team, had not been hurt. Everything was going to work out fine. No one was dead. Clint was back. This going better than she ever could have hoped. She had just gotten the message a moment ago that the teams plane was about to dock, and she had sent a message to the medical wing ensuring a room was prepared for Romanoff's quickly approaching surgery. If things continued to go as planned, then she should be in the operating room within the next hour or so. They had already waited for so long, she just hoped there was still time to reverse the damage that had been done….

Agent Hill arrived in the hangar seconds after the plan had pulled in, just as the door was being lowered for exit. Stark was the first one off, still wearing his beaten up worn down suit. She sincerely hoped he wouldn't charge Shield for a new one…. That was the last thing they needed right now. Then Thor lumbered off, with Bruce right behind him. Then, something in Maria skipped a beat as the last members of the team came off. Selfishly, her first reaction was relief at seeing Steve unharmed. She had not realized how worried she was about him until now, when she saw him in front of her, totally fine. The two made eye contact for a few emotionally charged seconds that neither of them had time to process, or even understand. Because Barton was next to Steve, and he was a man on a mission, and nothing would deter him. He was a force of energy pulling all of the focus of the room onto him, desperate to talk to someone who could give him the answers he so desperately craved.

Clint had to lean on Steve to stay upright, and was covered with bandages. But all the archer could think about was his partner. "Maria, where is she? Is she ok?" He demanded, almost falling as he lurched towards her. Maria grabbed him as he almost tripped to the floor. "She's fine Clint, you know she's a fighter. She's in the med wing. We have an operating room all ready,Romanoff can go in as soon as you say the word." Clint closed his eyes tightly, took a deep breathe. "Take me there, tell me everything. Please" The last word was a plea, as if the information of Natasha's battered condition could make things better, easier. A handful of doctors appeared as if out of nowhere, and swiftly began explaining everything they could to Clint, while evaluating his condition and taking him to the only place he wanted to be. His partners side.

Bruce followed them, wanting in on the doctor talk- and knowing he could help explain to Clint any part of the upcoming procedure he might be confused about. Tony disappeared to one of the labs, ordering Maria to tell him as soon as Nat went into surgery, or if her condition changed. However if there were any more ludicrous insane missions they needed him for, please just leave him alone for once. Thor wandered off to find some food- and then it was just Steve and Maria. They let the group of doctors walk ahead of them for a few steps, before following.

Steve didn't look- relieved exactly. Maria could tell he still carried the gulf of this entire situation inside of him. But maybe he looked a bit better. Maybe had realized this was not completely his fault. If he was not utterly carefree, it did seem as if some of his burden had been lightened with the retrieval of Clint. Or who knows, maybe Stark or Banner had finally managed to knock some sense into him, convince the super soldier Natasha would not die because of him.

She felt so- different walking next to him. She wasn't one to fall headfirst into random romances, and wasn't close to being in love with Steve. Maria told herself this. She only felt this lightness, this happiness, because the mission had gone well. That had to be it. The team of doctors increased their pace, and disappeared for a moment when they turned the corner. The two were alone in the hallway in that instant. Steve looked down, almost smiled at Maria.

"So? How is she really?" Maria stilled the beating of her heart. She was just anxious because she didn't want to admit they had almost lost Romanoff before they could stabilize her again. She was not thrilling at Steve smiling at her. This was life or death, she had to stop thinking about stupid romance already! "She's fine now, she gave us a pretty big scare earlier… Don't tell Barton but we thought we would lose her for a little bit. Honestly if you hadn't made it back within the next couple hours they would have had to start the surgery anyway. But she's stable enough to wait a little for the operation now, you know they'll do their best to save her."

Steve deflated when he heard this. "I guess that's better than we could have hoped. At least she's alive, right?" Maria nodded. They were almost to Natasha's room now, when she stopped. "Wait. We shouldn't go in there. It will be hard enough for Barton to say….. Whatever he needs to say to her, with a platoon of medical staff there. I doubt he'd be thrilled if we listened in." The two of them were standing in the hall, unsure what to do next. Split up? Wait alone for the next few hours? Try and get some work done? Steve looked down at Maria, spoke without thinking the first thing he thought of. "Will you wait with me? Until Nataha's out of the OR? I don't think I can handle it alone. I mean, I could, but, I don't want to. And somehow I doubt Stark would be a better choice to wait with. Heck he and Banner are probably going to hack a camera so they can watch a live feed of the surgery or something. Then harass the medical staff if they think they are doing something wrong." Maria laughed, "Sounds like something they would do. Maybe I should send someone to make sure Stark won't be messing with any of our cameras. I was going to practice at the shooting range if you want to come with…. I just can't focus on work right now. I couldn't when I was worried about you, um, your team, and I certainly can't when I am waiting to find out if one of our best agents will live or die. I figured if I can't work now I might as well practice my aim. Do you, want to come?" Steve almost smiled, and grabbed Maria's hand. "Let's go."

Clint had seen Natasha beat up before. Burnt, bleeding, holding guts inside herself with one hand when shooting up bad guys with the other. He had waited when she went through countless surgeries, tended her wounds after training together, nursed her back to something resembling a human being after rescuing her from torture. This was not one of the first times he was scared she was going to die. It was however one of the first times he had to consider it might actually happen. Because before, he had always known she could pull through. Natasha was the Black Widow! She had overcome it all! Poison, comas, explosions, bullet wounds, dog bites, arrows, shrapnel, acid burns, almost freezing to death. Whatever life threw at her, she could handle no doubt about it. It was what she had been molded and raised for, forced to do since she was a child. So Clint had always allowed himself to fear she would not make it through this next injury- But had always known deep down that she would be fine in a couple weeks. But this time felt different. It felt real. As if something had been damaged, ripped from him, and things would never be normal again.

He didn't want to believe she was hurt as badly as everyone had told him. They were over-exaggerating, preparing him for the worst case scenario, they hadn't seen Nat pull through the injuries he had watched her fully recover from. But then the doctor let him into her room. And it was worse than anything could have prepared the archer for. She didn't look she was injured, hurt. Or like she was currently in a coma, drugs coursing through her body. It didn't even look like she was dying. No. It looked like she was already dead. Clint couldn't breathe, the animal cry of pain that leapt from his lips was not something he could control. He pushed anyone in his path out of the way, he had to be next to Natasha. But when he was at her bedside, he didn't even know what to do. He was scared to touch her, not sure what bones were broken. The doctors had explained her most serious inures first, and then Clint had gotten impatient and rushed into the room before they could detail her minor wounds. He had to know someone was in bad shape when their broken bones counted as minor injuries in the overall scheme of things.

Clint sensed people leaving the room, when he looked up the bare minimum of staff was there. The entire situation was tragic and awkward, the doctor and two nurses hovering in the corners of the room, waiting for an emergency to happen lest they should be needed, tried not to intrude on Barton's moment.

Clint sat down in a chair that had appeared beside Nat's bed, reached out and grabbed her hand. He felt relief rush through him when he touched warm skin- the irrational part of his mind had almost convinced him maybe Nat was already dead. Clint so wished his partner would wake up, that he could talk to her. This was the most horrible feeling in the world seeing her hurt like this, knowing there was absolutely nothing he could do except hold tight to her hand and whisper in her ear.

"I thought we promised each other we'd had enough of this bullshit Romanoff, no more terrifying each other in hospitals. No more hospitals, period. You know how much we hate them. You owe me a beer for putting me through all this garbage. You should know that just because I'm here, that doesn't mean I am not mad at you right now for scaring me. Plus I am pretty sure you broke my record for most bones broken in a single mission, one more reason I should be pissed at you. Seriously, if you wanted my attention you could have just called me. I would have gone after the Winter Soldier with you, ya know that. Plus, no offense to Cap, I would have made sure you didn't get hurt. Don't tell him I said that though. PLUS if you had taken me with you I wouldn't have been kidnapped by yet another mad genius hoping to take control of the team…. Honestly, I thought we figured this out, we are a team Romanoff. We don't do jobs apart. You know I am no good at working alone, I should have been there with you." Suddenly Clint couldn't speak, couldn't breathe. Everything hurt, the room tilted sickeningly. He was no good working alone, he couldn't go back to working, being, living alone. Without her. Oh god he couldn't live if she died. Couldn't bear to go back to his life without her in it.

He could not let himself think about living a life like that. Devoid of the only thing that gave his existence meaning, that held him together when everything else felt like it was falling apart.

Hot tears burned in Clint's eyes, they felt like searing lava as they leaked out and snuck down his face. He squeezed Tasha's hand so hard he had to loosen up a bit for fear of breaking it. He couldn't do what he really wanted, couldn't take her in his arms and tell her he would make this better. This was something he couldn't make better. He had promised her he would always protect her, she had promised to protect him. He hadn't kept up his end of the bargain. Clint leaned in closer to Natasha, and in an even quieter desperate pleading voice spoke in her ear.

"Nat, be ok. You have to be ok. I wouldn't do this to you so you can't do this to me. I am so sorry I wasn't there, maybe I couldn't have helped you. But maybe I could have. That is something that is always going to haunt me, and I am so very sorry that I wasn't even given the chance to try and save you. I just, have to be real here. You always say I am too optimistic, I always try and hope for the best. Look on the bright side. And I know you think I am crazy for feeing like that, you've always said I need to be more real. Well you've finally got your wish- I need to prepare myself for the worst case scenario. I want to believe you will make it through this….. I do believe that you everyone, absolutely everyone around me is telling me otherwise. I don't want to believe this might happen, but now I have I can't assume you are going to be ok, and have our last conversation be me joking about you leaving our partnership to work with Rogers, and me complaining about the fact that I had to let Stark of all people rescue me. I couldn't live with myself if the last time we spoke I didn't take it seriously. So, you win. I am facing reality. It's time I got real and faced the facts of what might happen. I have to admit that you might die soon. Today even"

He was still squeezing her hand, he never wanted to let go. Listening to the beeping of machines, recording what could be some of the final moments of Natasha's life. He watched a monitor, counting down the beats of his partners heart. "Natasha….. Please don't die. I know that might not be something you can control, but I am begging you, if there is anyway you can decide what you do, please choose to stay here with me. I know you think love is for children, and you hate it when I get all goopey and emotional on you. Or imply we are friends. Or worse, hint that I might care about you. I know you, I understand you. I know you have a screwed up past, and can't admit if you have feelings at all. So I don't expect you to say you care about me. And I don't expect you to want to hear me say I care about you. Because that is just who you are- And I am sorry, I know you might hate me for this if you can hear me, but I have to say it. I DO care about you. I have since the first day we met and almost killed each other. You're the first person I ever actually wanted to stay partners with, and you've saved my life so many times I doubt I'll ever catch up so that we're even."

Clint choked on his last sentence. If Natasha did die today, he would never even have the chance to save her life again. They would never go on another mission together, no one would ever watch out for him in the field the way that she did. They would never bandage each others wounds after a mission, or volunteer to train new recruits just to see how many Natasha could scare away by the end of the day. No- He had to stop himself from thinking of all the things he would never get to do with her if she died, he couldn't let himself do that. Not now. Not yet.

"Nat, I have to tell you. Even if you can't hear me, even if you won't remember me saying this. I've wanted to tell you so many times, in so many ways. Figures I have to do it like this, right? I should have just said it when we were someone beautiful and awesome…. But this is more us, isn't it." The archer was still holding the assassins hand, he reached up and gently moved some hair out of her face. His mouth was pressed up against her ear, he didn't even try and stop the tears now flowing freely. He had wanted to say this for so long. He shouldn't have waited, it might be too late now.

"Natasha Romanoff…. I love you. I always have loved you, and no matter what happens I always will. You are the bravest, smartest, most gorgeous person I have ever met. And you don't deserve to have this happen, if this is your time you don't deserve to die like this. You don't deserve most of the awful stuff that has happened to you. But you've survived all of it, you have to survive this too. Don't do this to me Nat, you can't. You can't leave me, I love you, so you ca't die. I love you."

Clint kept saying those three words over and over, as if making up for lost time. Then, one of the doctors came over. Clint wasn't sure how long he had been sitting here, it wasn't long enough. That was impossible. ""Agent Barton, we have to take her in now. I am so sorry. I just want to tell you we have some of the most qualified doctors in the world in there, and we will all do everything in our power to make sure Agent Romanoff gets through this operation successfully." Clint was still squeezing her hand, he understood. He had to leave her now. Maybe forever.

He stood up, and gently kissed her on the forehead, still holding her hand. He gave it one final squeeze, hoping she would squeeze back. Give him a sign she was going to be ok. Instead her hand remained limp and unresponsive as he gently let it slip out of his grip.

REVIEW PLEASE PEOPLE!_


	20. Chapter 20

The waiting room was empty except for Clint, he idly wondered where the rest of the team was. He didn't actually care though. That wasn't important. Maybe they had already gone back to their separate homes, done with this job ready to resume their lives. Maybe they wanted to give him his privacy. Maybe they were already on more missions- Or who knows, maybe they were just sleeping. It didn't matter, he was beyond grateful for what they had done for him, but wether the team was were here or not they could do nothing more for Nat. And that was all he could care about, think about right now; Natasha. Was this his fault?Could he have seriously done anything to help her if he had been there with her on that mission? No matter the outcome of the surgery going on in the next room, if Nat lived or died, it would always haunt Clint that he hadn't been there to even try and save his partners life.

How long had he been sitting there? It must have taken at least an hour for the doctor to check Clint over, and finish cleaning and checking up on a few of the archers more extensive injuries. But right after that, Clint had returned to the waiting room, turning down offers of any food or drink except coffee. It had seemed like a good idea, except after downing a couple of cups he was so pumped up on caffeine adrenaline and fear that he could hardly sit still. He considered going to the shooting range, just to have a bow in his hands and be doing something would be great right now. But he didn't want to be that far from Tash. What if something went wrong and they wanted to bring him in? Or wanted to tell him something, and he was on the other side of the damn hellicarrier? So the archer sat in the waiting room, for how many hours he wasn't sure. He could have tried keeping track, but his mind was buzzing so wildly he found it hard to focus on anything other than what the doctor would tell him when he finally finished the surgery and came into the waiting room. To tell Clint if the surgery had been a success, or ended with death.

He hated hospital waiting rooms. Hospitals in general, really. They held nothing but bad memories for him. From times his abusive father landed him in the ER, to missions with Nat gone wrong, to so many mistake ending with operating tables and glaring hospital rooms. Up to now, waiting to see if his best friend was going to die. Clint hated most every single memory that was set in a hospital. And this one, this entire experience, was without a doubt his new least favorite. It absolutely beat every foul memory he had of himself being hospitalized; He would rather go through a dozen operations, suffer a hundred injuries than have to stand by helpless and know his partner was in pain. Dying. And there was nothing he could do. It was killing him inside.

Still, as much as Clint utterly despised hospitals and most all of the memories they held for him, a tiny minuscule piece of himself had to grudgingly admit a few hospitals had given him memories he held dear. They were some of the first places, only places where Natasha had expressed any kind of affection for him. Not in words, of course. She wasn't one to speak her emotions, or admit she had them. Even if she made it through today and was given another chance at life, he was unsure she would ever find the encourage to say the words I Love You to him. But there were other ways one could show another person they cared about them. Like the first time they were on a mission together and it went disastrously, and Clint had to have a risky operation, and he later learned that Nat had not left his side from the second he left the operating room, to when he finally woke up. Or when Clint had an infected wound, and to stay in bed for almost three horrible weeks. And every single day, a mysterious gift would appear in his room. A comic book. His favorite candy. A nerf bow and arrow. He had never been able to catch Natasha leaving him any of those gifts, she never reacted when he mentioned any of them. But he knew without a doubt that she had been the one to leave them for him. Who else could sneak into his hospital room without awaking him, alerting him that he was no longer alone?

Who else could care enough to give a lonely idiot archer presents? Clint didn't have anyone else who cared enough to do that. Almost no one who cared about him at all, honestly.

Who would be left to care about him if she died?

No, he had to stop thinking like that. She would get better. Maybe she'd have to stay in a hospital for a while, but he could finally repay the favor and leave HER random gifts to find in her hospital room. He would not leave her side once she came out of that room, no one could make him do otherwise. He would take care of her, do whatever she wanted, anything she asked of him, just please, please don't let her die.

The room was silent, but Clint could almost convince himself he could hear the noises in the next room. Beeping machines, murmuring voices overlapping each other, metal instruments clinking together. The subtle sound of surgical tools cutting. Slicing. Scraping. Peeling. Hopefully, healing. But he knew all of that was in his imagination. It was just so quiet hear that his brain was messing with him. He couldn't hear what the results of the operation were just yet, he was telling himself he could at least hear what was happening. He felt like such an idiot. A scared, hopeless idiot.

When the doctor finally came out, Clint had no idea what time it was, how long he had been here. He didn't care. "How is she?" He demanded, jumping out of his chair. The doctor looked exhausted, worse, he did not look happy. He wasn't answering, and that was filling Clint with more fear than he thought he could ever feel. "How is she? Please, is she ok?"

The doctor took a deep breathe, his eyes darted nervously around the room as if looking for an escape route. Clint knew what that meant. Whatever news he was about to hear, it was not good. "Barton… We've done everything we could. It appears the surgery went well, but there were more problems than we thought. We had to operate dangerously close to the spinal cord, we did our best, but we don't know what kind of damage we might have done. We need to keep her in a medical coma for the next couple days, she needs to stay still or she could reverse the work we just did. But then we are taking her off the drugs so she can wake up for a bit, and so we can get an idea of how the surgery affected her; and to see if she will wake up. I need to tell you, she might not. And even if she does, it's possible she will not be the same.


	21. Chapter 21

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ok, you guys are all caught up now, you will now have to wait for updates like the rest of the world over at FanFiction xD Just kidding, I doubt anyone even reads my story anymore... Anyway, it is almost over, and is going to end on the fourth of December as that is the day I first posted the story online. Please review? It does not take more than a minute, and really makes my day. You can even let me know what you want to see before this story ends. I loved writing this chapter, about how Natasha is reacting to all those drugs in her system and not being able to wake up.

She hated having drugs in her system. She had been through it all, had had every possible thing pumped into her veins as a young girl. By the time she turned thirteen the red room had her hooked on everything they could put their subjects on. Mostly chemicals and liquids that increased her strength, powers, length and (they claimed) quality of her life. These were strong drugs, that overwhelmed Natasha's system, and increased her dependency of the red room through her addiction. The drugs had made sure that it would be even more difficult for anyone to escape; ensuring that if anyone did manage to, they would quickly be crippled by the addiction and detox of suddenly being off of all their medication. Making it even easier for those who betrayed the red room to be caught, and properly disposed of.

But Natasha had managed to escape. Though if Clint hadn't been the one to save her, she would never have made it. He had taken her to one of his secret apartments, one she later learned no one knew about in Shield, she had been the first person besides him to step foot in it. He had protected her, allowed her to detox. Got her through hell, and when she came out on the other side, offered her a chance at a new life. Even after what he had done for her, risked by taking her in instead of taking her out, she had not trusted him. But she had not killed him either, and at the time that was more than could be said about any of the others in the past who had attempted to help the Black Widow. She had gone with him, and that day vowed to never fall victim to drugs altering her mind or body again.

So what was happening now? How had she gotten here? Everything was dark, and dulled, numbness and nothing. Just as she felt the slow irregular beat of her heart, the struggle of her lungs filling themselves with air, she could feel the heavy medicine as it flowed through her body. This place was a mystery, and at the same time all too familiar. Occasionally a dull pain would start at the very base of her being, and begin to consume her. And she welcomed this, welcomed the sensation, the feeling, reassurance she was (probably) still alive. Then a pinprick of annoyance would rise up in her wrist, and like a blanket the drugs would wrap themselves around her, not quite putting the Black Widow to sleep, and preventing her from waking up.

In rare moments of clarity, she tried to piece together what had happened. Once the first memory pierced the veil, it became easier to put together the rest. The Winter Soldier. Her old nemesis. She had been after him, been trying to finally catch the ghost. Had he captured her? Was she under enemy hands? She had to wake up… Had to escape, she refused to die like this. Drugged like an animal, without the smallest of fights. She would rather kill herself than go like this…. At this thought, the pinprick came again, and soon after it whatever drugs she was on overwhelmed her.

But the next time she could again form her ideas, her words into strings of thoughts, she remembered. She killed the Winter Soldier. They killed the Winter Soldier. Who was they? Her and Clint? No, not right, that was wrong. He was on a mission in New Mexico guarding a hammer…. He was being controlled by a Demigod and there was not a damn thing she could do about it… He was about to kill her, but instead she collapsed and he picked her up in his arms. Told her she could stop running, it would be ok now.

No. Clint was in Asia, and Steve had been with her when they took down the Soldier. That was right. She remembered like a flash of sun entering this gloom, Steve stealing a car and warning her to not put her feet up on the dash. Breaking into a building and finding an army of soldiers with the soldier- with Bucky, Steve said he was Bucky, at their core. She shot the bullet that went through him, she remembered because before shooting him in the heart, she had aimed for the same place he had shot her. A petty revenge maybe, but one she had enjoyed carrying out. What had happened next?

Everything was so slow and messed up in her brain. She remembered feeling like this, having a stranger whisper in her ear. Now someone else was whispering to her and it was all getting so messed up."You are loyal to Mother Russia. Your name is Anastasia, your husband is dead and you are a ballet dancer." "Nat, you have to wake up. I need you." "You will do as we say, and obey the Red Room." "You can't leave me, I don't know what I would do without you." "You are to work alone, always." "Tash, I can't live alone again." "If we ask you, you will kill yourself for us." "I wish it could have been me instead Natasha. I would rather kill myself than have you die."

Clint's voice made Natasha want to fight even harder to wake up, and confused her even more. Was this a trick? Was she hearing things? Was Clint even here? He sounded so sad, so very sad. He was so much less damaged than she had ever been, she still wanted to protect him. Not that she would say that out loud. He shouldn't be sad, not over her. She never thought if she died anyone would be there to cry over the body. Well now she had someone who would do more than that, and she wished that he did not care so he could be spared this heartbreak.

There had been an explosion. So many explosions. Tearing her parents bodies apart, setting her house on fire. Throwing Steve away from her, knocking him into a wall. Giving her an opening to get in, find the target, and get out. Tossing her out of the window of the lab, Banner landing heavily next to her as she made impact with the her into a wall, again, and again, and again. How many times can someone exist in the midst of fire, heat, pure power, and destructiveness, before they are not lucky enough to make it out alive? Apparantly she had been able to do so at least one more time. She remembered the force introducing her to the side of the building, then burying her in debris and ash, and the question of why she was still alive.

Natasha's thoughts were flipping and playing so rapidly she could hardly focus on them. Memories she had buried down in the depths of her soul, hoping to never again remember, where played out as clearly as the day they happened. During those times she desperately wished her friends (or enemies) would pump more of the drugs into her, allowing her to go back to the darkness. When she was 12 a girl she had dared to call a friend in the red room had gone on a mission, and had come back with some nasty burns on her face, a badly broken leg, and sight in only one eye. The girl had been put up as an example to the others. "Let your comrade be a message to every last one of you. She was sent on a mission, and failed. She has been injured badly enough to need several months to recover, and almost blew her entire cover. We have brought you here today to show what happens when you work for the Red Room, and provide nothing but a drain on our resources as you recover from injuries you cause through your own carelessness. The girl had whimpered, and young Natasha sensed what was to come. She did not want to believe it would actually happen, but it did. The sound of a gunshot filled the room, the fog enveloping and consuming Natasha turned the same color of red that her fallen comrades color had been.

Was she here to heal safe in the arms of Shield, or had she been captured so that once they knew she would live, an enemy force could get the pleasure of destroying her? Or worse, once again tear her down, and bring her up as a new puppet to be controlled?

Soon, she knew, this would be over, She would either wake up and, and learn her situation, or else move on to whatever was next. Give up. Die. For once she had no clue what was going on, no idea what to do.

Sometimes she had moments where she knew that she was hallucinating, but didn't care. Because she knew that she couldn't be a little girl again, standing at the ballet barre learning how to dance. No, she was not on her first mission, hardly hesitating before carrying out her first contracted kill. Because that first time, after the mission, she felt nothing. And now living it out again she was filled with guilt. She had to work to convince herself that she was not really back in Budapest, meeting Clint for the first time. Probably because part of her wanted that memory to be real.

Other times, she hovered close to breaking the unconsciousness, never for more than a few minutes, always so close to breaking out into consciousness never quite able to. During those times she was sure she heard the beeping of machines, smelled the sharp antiseptic smell of a hospital room.

Then, there were times when she was not at all sure if she was almost on the verge of waking up, or hallucinating. Like when she heard Tony's loud laughter, overconfident, hiding what he was really feeling- whatever that was. Or when she heard Thor's booming voice, trying to be quite, and rambling about things like Asgardian medicine, and his hope that she would feel better soon.

The times when she was most unsure about what was happening, was when she heard Clint talking to her. Telling her stories of his childhood she had never heard before. Making inside jokes, promising if she got better he would do anything.

And again and again, she was sure she heard Clint say that he loved her. Could not live without her. Begging her to wake up.

Natasha was not 100% sure if all of this was even real or not, did not know if she wanted it to be. All she knew was that she wanted to wake up, had to wake up, for Clint.


	22. Chapter 22

The hospital room had grown to look more and more homey in the last few days. Normally when Natasha was injured the only guest she had was Clint- But with the entire team and Maria Hill on board, the sleeping assassin had a steady stream of visitors. Visitors who brought gifts. When Tasha was first admitted, the hospital room had been bare and sterile. Now it had a dozen or so drawings done by Steve up on the walls, each done in vibrant colors that added a level of brightness to the room. Bruce had downloaded hundreds of songs onto a Stark phone laying around the lab, and given it to Clint with some headphones. He had suggested the archer play music for Natasha whenever he could, it might help stimulate brain activity. Thor didn’t have much to bring- Instead of brining gifts for Natasha, he made sure to bring Clint food from the cafeteria. The archer hardly left his partners side, and if it wasn’t for Thor he probably would not have eaten at all. 

As for Tony…. He had somehow hijacked the shipment orders that Shield hellicarrier's received every month or so, that usually had nothing but food, weapons ammo, medicine, you know, important things. But the special orders arranged by Tony consisted of dozens of things that he insisted would make Natasha feel better. Luxurious blankets, a wardrobe of new pajamas and robes, Russian nesting dolls ("So when she wakes up she will feel at home!”) boxes of candy, gift baskets, and flowers. Tony kept bringing box after box of gifts into the room- clearly he wanted to help, and felt the only thing he could do right now was give gifts. It was a sweet thought, and surprisingly most of the gifts were relatively normal or useful. Ok, the giant stuffed rabbit he bought her was a bit odd. Most of the stuff was sweet though. The only problem was that Stark kept bringing so many gifts on board that Natasha’s room was soon overflowing with them and Maria insisted that the majority of them be brought back “down to the mainland” and distributed among people who could actually use them. After that Tony could only show his concern for Natasha by visiting her like everyone else. 

The doctors had allowed an hour a day for the team to come see their fallen comrade. So once a day everyone would crowd into the room, make awkward chit chat, reassure one another Natasha was going to be just fine, and leave. Of course Clint didn’t count as a visitor- the medical staff understood how close the two assassins were, and allowed him to stay in the room as much as he wanted. He hardly left her side.

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It was the third day of Natasha’s coma, and tomorrow doctors would stop giving her drugs that made her sleep, and shoot different ones into her. Then, they would just have to wait to see how damaged she was when she woke up- And if she woke up. No, Clint couldn’t think that. She was going to wake up tomorrow, and she might have trouble remembering some things, have to relearn a few of her skills, but he would help her. She was going to be fine. The archer kept telling himself this, but it did not do much to ease the nervous knot stuck in the pit of his stomach.

There was a light tap on the door, and one of the nurses entered. She did not look too happy, at first Clint was worried she was going to make him leave, or give him bad news about his partner. Instead she said, “Captain Roger’s is here to see you. I explained it’s not visiting hours, but he went to the head doctor and got permission. So really unless you turn him away, there’s nothing I can do.” Clint hesitated at first, wondering if he was up for a conversation with the man when it was just the two of them. He had seen Steve since he got back, since he learned all of the details of Natasha’s accident. But this would be the first time it was just the two of them, with no one else to act as a bumper between any possibly akward or explosive conversations. Well, he might as well get this over with. Clint smiled at the nurse, who had really been very nice through this whole experience. “Yeah, please, bring him in.” 

Steve Rogers looked uncomfortable as he entered the room, as if he felt that he didn’t belong here. He was privately wondering if he should just go back to his room, or Hill’s office, and wait to see how tomorrow would play out. Hope Natasha would wake up and be fine. But he couldn’t keep living with himself without explaining what had happened that day to Barton. He had to apologize, even though in his mind he was certain he would not be forgiven. 

Steve tried to smile, nodded towards a chair on the other side of the bed from Clint. “May I?” He asked, not wanting to overstep any boundaries. Hawkeye shrugged in response, still not really sure why Captain America was here, or what he wanted. The two men sat across from each other, wondering who would be the first to speak. Steve sighed, he had decided to come here, he was the one who had to apologize. Of course he should be the one to start.

“I’m sorry for coming here outside of the normal visiting hour, I guess that was inconsiderate of me. I should have asked you if I could come, or at least given you some warning. I just, have some things to say, and I didn’t much want to say them when everyone was here. I guess I should get this over with.” Steve’s eyes darted towards Natasha, then rested on Clint. “It’s just… I’m sorry for how things ended on that mission. I should have been able to protect her. We were both sloppy, we’d been fighting for hours, and I should have made sure the target was dead before thinking we were done. I wasn’t aging attention, and then I just turned around, and saw the target was still alive. I didn’t have time to react before everything exploded. But I can’t help but think I should have done something. Anything. There wasn’t enough time to react. Natasha has always had my back, and it’s just killing me that this time I didn’t have hers, and now she’s laying here in a hospital bed. I’m sorry.”

Steve should have been relived to finally say this to Clint, get it off of his chest. But he had not thought his words through, and now he felt he had overstepped some horrible boundary he should not have crossed. Clint and Natasha had been partners for years, Steve had only worked with her a handful of times. If Natasha watched after anyone on the team, it was Clint. She always had HIS back more than she had ever had Steve’s. 

Clint reached out to smooth over a wrinkle made in the blankets of Natasha’s bed, trying to find what he wanted to say. “You don’t need to apologize Rogers. At first, I’m not going to lie, I was pissed at you. But I can’t rationally think that this was your fault. Maybe you made mistakes, maybe Natasha did. But this stuff happens in our line of work. People get hurt, accidents happen. We think people are dead, and they somehow come back to life and blow up a building. Sure, it’s always a good idea to check the mark is dead before relaxing thinking you had won. But, I mean, if Nat thought he was dead too, it must have been pretty damn convincing that he actually was. It’s hard to trick her. You don’t have to apologize Rogers. I don’t think you could have done anything differently. It’s ok, this isn’t your fault.”

Clint said all of this confidently, and Steve felt that the archer really believed what he was saying. It didn’t make him feel much better though. The guilt was still rolling through the Super Soldier, but what else could he do? He had already apologized. Clint had accepted, and reassured him this wasn’t his fault. What else could he do? Order Clint to become furious at him? Make the archer accuse him of being a careless idiot who had possibly killed the Black Widow? Steve just had to accept that yet another person did not think this was his fault, and move on. 

He apologized again, then apologized for bothering Clint, and left. He planned to go to the training center, and work out his feelings on a few punching bags. Instead Steve found himself entering Maria’s office, where he spent the rest of the afternoon drawing and talking with her. After the soldier left, Clint reached out and grabbed Natasha’s unresponsive hand. 

It had been very thoughtful of Steve to come apologize, and Hawkeye even saw how some people might think that this was the Captains fault. But Clint just couldn’t see it that way- He couldn’t get past the idea that on one of the few missions that Clint had not gone on with Natasha, she had been horribly injured. He couldn’t shake the conviction that if he had gone with, right now she would be fine. The rational part of his brain knew that was stupid, seriously, if THE Captain America couldn’t have prevented this from happening, what could Clint have done? Deep down, he knew this wasn’t his fault. 

Maybe if Clint had been on that mission Tasha would be fine right now. Maybe Steve could have been more careful, payed closer attention to his surroundings. But they didn't have a time machine, nothing could change what had already happened. The only thing they could do was keep moving forward, and hope that things would work out for the best. No matter what happened, each of the men would always have to live with this guilt, sure that this was their fault. Even if Natasha was perfectly fine they would probably always feel this way. But each of them were used to fee lining guilty over mistakes they had made in the past- No matter what happened, eventually they would be able to get over these feelings, and hopefully move on with their lives.   
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	23. Chapter 23

Maria was typing away at her laptop, trying to stay busy, trying not to let her drooping eyelids close and give in to the sleep she so desperately needed.She had been working herself so hard the last week, trying to distract herself trying to stay focused. She’d spent time with Steve, and that had helped take her mind off of Natasha and her coma. It had actually been kind of awesome. They had done some training together, and Steve had tried to teach her how to draw. And then when they decided that was a hopeless endeavor, he had spent a couple hours drawing whatever Maria asked. 

And they had talked. About their pasts, and different experiences working for the Army. They discussed their training, and swapped war stories. Maria even told a few stories to Steve about her past, what it was like growing up with a single father who wanted nothing more than a son. Steve told her about growing up with Bucky, and how he really felt about this future world. 

When she was around Steve, Maria didn’t just forget to be worried about Natasha. She forgot all of her worries, all of the work piling up, every problem she had to deal with. Around Steve, Maria didn’t feel like an agent. She felt like a woman who was falling in love.

At this thought, Maria gasped a deep breathe of air, and squeezed her eyes tightly closed. She wasn’t falling in love- she couldn’t be falling in love with Steve. It was unprofessional. Impossible. They were coworkers, and honestly he was a living legend. She was just an agent of Shield who did more desk work than field work. He probably didn’t even like her in that way, just saw her as a friend. Maria was not used to feeling this way, and it humiliated her that she was falling in love with a world famous celebrity who had saved the world multiple times. God, she was as bad as one of those crazy fangirls. Next thing you know she was going to be writing goopy fan fiction,and buying Captain America posters. 

She was so tired, but she couldn’t sleep now. Her dreams were either haunting nightmares of Romanoff dying, accusing her of not sending in a good enough team. Accusing her of being the reason she might die. And when her dreams were not nightmares of Natasha’s dead eyes, Clint’s empty face, they were of Rogers. She dreamed of him taking his hand in hers. Being held in his arms. She dreamed of his lips pressing against hers….

The dreams never went any farther than that, but they did little to help Maria not fall in love with Steve. 

She wasn’t in love with him. God, if she was, this could become such a massive mess.

She was tired. Maybe if she laid her head on the desk for just a minute, she would be able to sleep for a few minutes…. Maybe it would clear her head and muddled feelings…. 

Who knows how long she slept? All Hill knew was that nightmares haunted her. Faces that she couldn’t quite make out, bullets whistling past her. Barton crying accusing her of killing his partner, demanding why she thought it was a good idea to send out Steve and Romanoff alone. Then someone was violently shaking her, and she was awake. 

“Maria, wake up!” Steve was saying urgently, shaking her arm, trying to pull her out of the gripping hold of her nightmares. Maria’s eyes flew open, and her heart only beat faster when she found herself staring into Steve’s eyes. “You ok?” He asked, crystal blue eyes filled with concern. “Sorry, it’s just… You were having a nightmare, I had to wake you up.” They were so close to each other, Maria could sense every scant inch of space between them. She took a deep breathe, and forced herself to pull away from him. 

“no, it’s fine. It was just a dream, I’m fine, it’s fine. Thank you. Um, I’m fine.” She was dulled by sleep, and tripping over her own words. Fear from the nightmare still coursed through her, and oh my gosh Steve was so close to her. Too close, she couldn’t think straight. She backed away from him in her chair, and then stood up. He looked so anxious, like he was worried about her. 

“Are you ok? Can I get you anything?” He asked anxiously, stepping forward. “No, it’s ok. I shouldn’t have tried to sleep. I need to get this work done anyway….. Thanks for waking me up. Um, you can go now. Or, stay, whatever , I’ll just be working.” She rubbed her eyes to clear the remnants of sleep and nightmares from them, and then opened up a report she needed to fill out on her computer. Steve looked confused, like he wasn’t sure what to do. He sat down on the couch, and Maria tried to work for a few minutes. 

Then he said, “ I have them too. All the time, actually. It helps if you talk about them…. Do you, maybe want to talk?” Maria considered it, and shook her head. “No… I think for now it would be better if I kept them in my head. I’m not up for talking about nightmares, that’s not my style.” But Steve couldn’t accept this, he knew she was upset and just couldn’t let it go. After a couple moments of silence, he got up from the chair he’d been sitting in. “I mean, you don’t have to talk about it, but I don’t want to see you upset. Maybe there’s someone else you would want to talk to? It could really help. Or can I get you anything? They have food int eh cafeteria, or maybe would you want a drink? When I have nightmares sometimes it helps me if I drink tea. Or maybe I can-“

Maria couldn’t take it anymore. She was so confused. Why was he acting like this, being so nice? Was he just that friendly, or did he have feelings for her too? She didn’t like this, wasn’t used to it. “No! Stop, I told you I’m fine, gosh Rogers!” She snapped, slamming her laptop closed. Steve stared at her mouth agape, and Maria felt guilt flood through her, mixing with the confusion. “Rogers, I’m sorry. I’m just not used to…. Whatever this is.” Now Steve was the one who looked confused. “What aren’t you used to?” He asked, in disbelief. The thoughts flood through her brain. She wasn’t used to having someone that she laughed with, someone who worried she was having nightmares. He was the only person who even knew she HAD nightmares. She wasn’t used to looking into someones eyes and wanting to get lost in them, she wasn’t used to having someone who would spend an hour daring pictures for her. She wasn’t used to having a friend. She was not at all used to being in love. 

“I’m not used to having someone care about me.” She blurt out, before she could think. As soon as she uttered the words, she wished she could suck them back into her mouth, or wipe the memory of them from Steve’s brain. She felt her entire face go crimson with humiliation, and she couldn’t look him in his eyes. His beautiful crazy eyes. He wasn’t saying anything, and she didn’t want to know what he was thinking of her. But she did. “Do you care about me?” Damn it! Why couldn’t she keep her mouth shut! Why couldn’t she stop saying these things? She sat down in her chair, and buried her head in her hands, wishing the floor would open up and swallow her whole, take her away from this. Maybe she was still having a nightmare. That had to be it. Please let it be it. 

She heard his footsteps move towards her, she wished they were going in the opposite direction. “Go away. I’m an idiot. I didn’t mean it.” She mumbled, burying her face deeper into her arms. She couldn’t see him, but she sensed him sit in a chair next to her. And then his hand was under her chin, lifting her blushing face up to look at his. “I care about you Maria. And I hope you care about me- I’m, I’m not used to this either. I’ve liked you for a while, honestly I guess I should have made that clearer before. I’m just not very good at this. I care about you. I want to help you, and make you smile, I want to protect you and make sure you’re happy. I love talking with you, and I love that when we’re training you can actually hold your own against me. And beat me most of the time when it comes to target practice at the shooting range.” He was so close to her now, one of his hands reached out and tucked a wayward stand of hair behind her ear. “I love that you hold your own, and control the attention of any room that you step into. And I don’t want to be out of turn here…. But I think I love you, Maria.” 

And then Maria couldn’t speak, couldn’t run away, couldn’t breathe. Every ounce of her being was focused on Steve’s lips against hers, the way that he kissed her, his hand against the back of her head and how right everything suddenly felt.  
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HA BET YOU THOUGHT I HAD ABANDONED ALL OF YOU, RIGHT???? WRONG!!!!! I AM SO HAPPY I POSTED THIS CHAPTER, IT LITERALLY TOOK ME THIS LONG TO THINK OF A GOOD IDEA AND WRITE IT DOWN!!!!! I REALLY HOPE YOU LIKE IT, NEXT CHAPTER MIGHT BE THE LAST ONE BUT I AM NOT SURE. Reviews really do help me write faster, so please review guys!!!! Thanks for sticking with this story for so darn long, I hope you enjoy this chapter!!! Have to say it again, please. Review.


	24. Chapter 24

This chapter starts right where the last one left off, so if you don’t recall what happened last time around, maybe hit that previous chapter button :D A huge thank you to robbiepoo2341 who helped me think of this chapter idea, and motivated me to update this! She is a great writer, and I am currently working with her and other amazing writers on an Avengers/Hunger Games story collaboration. It is really good so far, (I’m writing Natasha, and it’s been so fun!!) if you want to check it out just search for “In the End You Always Kneel” by the Freelancer Collaboration. I helped write chapter two, head over there and let me know what you think! But, for now, ENJOY THIS MUCH DESERVED UPDATE!!!! Sorry it took so long, thank you for waiting around for me to finish this story!!!  
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In that moment, everything felt perfect. Steve had kissed other girls since getting out of the ice (In spite of what Natasha might think….) but those kisses had been superficial. Meaningless. A search for something he had lost, and thought he would never get back. But this kiss? This one meant something. It made him happy, and less worried about all of his problems, and just felt-

Suddenly someone cleared their throat behind them, and Steve and Maria broke contact with each other abruptly, leaping away from each other. Clint was standing in the doorway, mouth slightly agape, an eyebrow raised in disbelief. 

“Um…… Sorry to interrupt?” He said, trying to hide his smirk. Maria was blushing furiously, and for a second Steve was speechless. “Barton! We’re just, this is, um, well-“ Clint lifted a hand, smirk growing wider on his face. “Yeah, I don’t want to know the details. Later, maybe, I’ll be bugging you for the whole horrible story. But I’m not really up for hearing it now….."

There was an excitement in Clint's eyes, he moved as if he’d just been relieved of a heavy burden. Steve sensed the archer had news- and he didn’t want to get his hopes up too much, but it seemed the news was good. 

Sure enough, before Steve or Maria could speak, Clint blurted out the words he couldn’t hold in any more. “Natasha’s starting to respond- the Dr. thinks that she’s going to wake up sometime in the next couple hours.” 

Clint was beaming as he said this and more, and then Maria was saying something, but Steve couldn’t hear either of them because he was so relieved, he couldn’t pay attention to anything other than the fact Natasha was going to be ok. He hadn’t killed her. She was going to wake up, before long she would be back in the field, and this whole nightmare would just be a story Nat would tell to scare new recruits. 

Steve pulled Clint into a quick half hug, “That’s amazing Clint, that’s the best news I could have heard, you have no idea how relieved I am to hear it.” Clint was grinning, happiness practically radiating off of him. “Ha! Yeah, I have some idea how you feel, I was pretty excited to hear it myself.” 

The three of them stood in the room, happy and relieved to hear Natasha was waking up. But then there was not much else to say, and an awkwardness settled over the room as everyone reconsidered the intimate moment that Barton had just walked in on. Suddenly everyone was talking at once. 

“Well I have to go fill out some paperwork-“ “Can we visit her soon?” “Uh, so are you two like a couple now?” Everyone’s words overlapped each other, then the three agents stared at each other as Steve and Maria blushed furiously at the archers question, and Clint grinned as he answered Steve’s question. 

“The Doctor said that only a couple people can visit her now Steve, maybe come around tonight. I can’t promise she’ll be responsive….. But it’s looking good. Have fun with your “paperwork” Hill….. Gotta go fill out some of that in an office relationship stuff I’m guessing!” Laughing, actually laughing for the first time in days, Clint left the room leaving Steve and Maria still blushing and avoiding looking in the others eyes. 

Bust as soon as they were alone they smiled at each other, sheepishly at first, embarrassed they’d been caught, but then as it hit them that Natasha was probably going to be ok their grins grew wider and then somehow Maria was in Steve’s arms again. 

And this time, because fear and guilt were not weighing so heavily upon Steve’s shoulders, it felt even better when he kissed her for the second time.  
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The hospital room was quietly busy, buzzing with doctors who continuously checked and rechecked machines, administered new drugs, tried to remove the remains of the old ones they’d been pumping into her. There was no idle chit chat in Natasha’s room now, but there was a lightness here that had been absent since the start of all this. Because now there was hope, that rather than helping Agent Romanoff cling to life for a few more days, that they were helping her recover. For the first time since this started the medical staff felt there was a chance this might turn out alright, and they were not just wasting their time on a tragic hopeless cause. 

Clint was in his chair at the side of her bed. Natasha’s hand was in his, and he was talking too softly for the staff to hear. When his mouth got too parched, his lips too dry from talking too much, Clint would sign words into Natasha’s hand, using the sign language that they had invented after he lost most of his hearing. 

Always tuned into her needs, watching for any signs she might be improving or slipping away, Hawkeye was even more alert today, intently searching for the slightest clue that Natasha could be waking up. He kept calling Drs. and nurses over, asking them if they thought she would wake up soon, or if it was somehow a good sign she wasn’t responding yet, and does it always take this long to come out of a coma if you were put in one on purpose? They did their best to answer his redundant questions and ease his troubled mind, but when the minutes ticked by and there was still no sign of life from Tasha, it was harder and harder for the staff to be optimistic when talking to Clint. 

It wasn’t looking good. Finally it was time to tell Clint things were only going down hill from here, to tell him that every minute that went by meant it was less and less likely that Natasha was going to be ok. 

Clint was still holding her hand, the Dr. who had been taking care of Natasha from the start of all this sat down in a chair next to the archer, a grim look on his face. He was ready to give a little speech. Explain that sometimes you put people in a coma like this, and they just didn’t wake up. Try and comfort Barton, tell him that maybe later tonight Romanoff would show some signs of life. Begin to prepare him for the worst case scenario. 

But then Clint stopped talking to Natasha about a mission they had gone on a couple of years ago, he sat up straighter in his chair, and leaned in closer to her bed. “Hey, she, Natasha- I swear, I think she just squeezed my hand.” Instantly the focus of every person in that room focused on the woman laying on the bed. Drs. and nurses rushed forward, a half dozen little tests were performed, everyone was talking at once, and then the Dr. who had been about to prepare Clint for the worst stood up and raised his voice. 

“Be quiet, everyone! Agent Romanoff responded to Agent Barton, she can’t do that again, if she can’t hear him over all of this noise!!!!” At that everyone shut up, and Clint leaned back in, closer to Natasha, and spoke softly at first, then louder, not caring if anyone heard. 

“Natasha, can you hear me? Tasha? Natasha? Come on, I know you like getting your sleep, but you need to wake up already and quit being so lazy.” Clint tried to laugh at this, but got choked up. He swallowed hard, and continued. “Come on Nat, I know you’re just messing with me now. No one likes a tease, you can’t just squeeze my hand and leave me hanging like this. Can you do it again, Nat? Please? Natasha? Please, let me know you can hear me……”

Her hand hung limply around his, and Clint couldn’t breathe. Had he imagined it? No, her hand had tightened around his, just for a second. “Nat? Come on, I know you can hear me. Please, just….. Let me know that you’re in there.” 

The room was wrought with tension, the moment stretched out and Clint could not have said how long he sat there, holding her hand in his. 

He whispered her name, someone on the other end of the room wouldn’t have been able to hear him. “Tasha…….” And then, she moved. Her thumb traced the outline of his palm, it ran over a scar Clint had on the edge of his hand, and then she lightly squeezed her hand around his. Just for an instant. It was enough to make Clint feel like he could conquer the world. 

“She squeezed my hand, she moved, she heard me! Did you see that?” Clint asked, gasping, trying to control the emotions swelling up inside of him. “She’s heard me, Natasha, did you hear me? You’re going to be ok, you hear me? You’re going to be fine!” She brushed her thumb against his hand again, but didn’t squeeze, like she was too tired to do that again.

For the next few hours Drs. came running in and out of the room, examining Natasha and giving contradicting opinions, asking questions, and basically being a pain in Clint’s ass. He knew Natasha needed the help, but he felt the most helpful thing right now could be if everyone else would leave them alone, and let Clint talk her back to consciousness. 

Clint didn’t stop talking, even if he was saying the same words over and over. And then, she was squeezing his hand every few minutes, then tracing the scars and callouses that covered his fingers from years of playing with bow strings and knives.

Natasha's eyelids started twitching, as she toyed with the idea of opening her eyes. Tried to remember how to do that, as the drugs gradually faded from her mind. And then, there she was. Natasha’s eyes were locked onto Clint’s, and damn it, he didn’t want to be crying now, but he never thought he would see those beautiful eyes staring at him again. He couldn’t help swiping a few tears away before they escaped. Natasha would just feel worse if she had to watch him cry- And honestly she’d probably make fun of him for it later. He almost hoped that she would. 

Her eyes moved just bit too slowly, Clint knew she wasn’t fully ok. Her gaze caught on certain things, tripped over faces as if she was trying to place them but couldn’t manage to.It hurt Clint more than he could say to look down at her eyes and see confusion, pain, anxiety, maybe even fear there. But then, those green eyes returned to his face, and instead of looking panicked or dazed, they looked normal. When Natasha looked at him, the anxiety in her eyes went away. It was like she knew everything was going to be ok, because she knew Clint was there. And that was enough to ease her mind. 

Clint gently moved the hair out of her face and away from her eyes, dabbed water on her dry cracked lips, and reveled in the joy that she was awake, and looking at him, and oh gosh he didn’t want to get his hopes up but maybe she would actually be ok after all. 

Natasha was a good patient, and tried to do what the medical staff told her to as they ran tests to try and gauge how much damage the coma and surgery might have done to her. She blinked when they asked her to on command, tried to move individual fingers on both hands, but seemed to only be able to control the individual digits of her right hand at the moment. They asked her yes and no questions, and asked her to respond by blinking once or twice.

Yes, she was in pain. No, Tony Stark was not on her last mission. Yes, Steve Rogers was. No, Clint hadn’t been there either. No, it was not fall right now. No, she didn’t know what day it was. Yes, she was in pain. No, she did not want more medicine. 

Clint knew these questions were necessary, to check for possible brain damage. And of course she had only just woken up, just because she wasn’t answering every question correctly now didn’t mean that she wouldn’t remember the correct answers soon. Still it was unnerving when Natasha waited far too long to decide that yes, Thor was currently on earth. Or when she was asked if she knew if Steve was alive, and blinked no. 

But that was fine. She had just woken up, she would get better. Clint told himself this, and just smiled, smiled, had to keep smiling, couldn’t appear upset, because then how would Natasha feel if she knew how scared he suddenly was that maybe her brain was not healed? That maybe it never would be? 

But Clint didn’t let any of that fear show on his face, because every time she took too long to answer, or felt she had said the wrong thing, her eyes gravitated back towards him for encouragement. And no matter if she had answered right or wrong, Clint would smile, and squeeze her hand or push her hair out of her face, and tell her she was doing fine. It was obvious she wanted to try and move more, test her abilities, but as the Dr’s repeatedly told her she needed to stay still right now, or risk doing damage after the surgery. 

Eventually the tests ended for the day, and when asked if Clint wanted to let the rest of the team in to see Natasha, he paused. He pictured Tony being too loud, blaring obnoxious music, trying to force Tasha to talk or laugh at one of his raunchy jokes. Thor, stumbling over his feet like a puppy, with not much to say, but wanting to be of help. Banner would be an ok visitor, but then in her current state Natasha might associate him with the Hulk. And that would not help her feel any better. The only person Clint considered inviting here now was Steve- But not yet. He wasn’t ready for more apologies, and guilt from the Captain. He told himself Steve would feel better if he could come visit Nat once she was more lucid, and hopefully could do more than blink her eyes yes or no. 

So, Clint smiled at the Dr. who had asked if he wanted to bring in visitors, and shook his head. “No, not yet. Could you let the rest of the team, and Hill know that she’s awake? And, you know, ok? Maybe don’t tell Stark yet. As soon as he hears Nat’s up he’s going to want to throw a party or do something else stupid.” 

Barton glanced down at his partner, and savored the fact that her beautiful eyes were staring back up at him. “So yeah, tell everyone but Stark for now. And…… Tell Steve to drop by here tonight, would you be up for a visitor later?” Natasha squeezed his hand and Clint grinned. “Ok, tell the Captain that he should be able to see Agent Romanoff later tonight.” 

Then Clint was alone with Natasha for the first time in weeks. Her eyes were glued to his face, and she was smiling, even though she looked exhausted. Clint wrapped both of his hands around hers, and was smiling even though he suddenly was worried he was going to start tearing up again. 

“So, are you too tired to try and talk, or were you just staying quiet so the Doc wouldn’t start a whole new round of tests?” Natasha’s smile grew wider, her lips parted slightly, and she spoke in a voice gravelly and strained from misuse, forming the word carefully as she spoke for the first time in days. “Maybe…..” 

Clint laughed, and had to resist the urge to lean in closer and kiss her forehead like he had done so many times in the last few days. Instead he pulled her hand up towards him, closed his eyes and rested his forehead against their joined hands savoring the simple fact that she was holding onto him. Her hand was grasping his, not just laying limp and unresponsive.

She was here. 

She was alive.

Clint looked up when Natasha took a breath, and started to speak slowly, carefully forming each syllable. “I’m sorry, that I put you through this. Really….. We need to stop doing this.” She was smiling, and Clint chuckled a little. “I don’t know, it’s become a tradition for us, I’d hate to end the fun. We work together for a while, things go well, some idiot (Fury) breaks us up for solo missions, one of us gets horribly hurt and scares the shit out of the other, we get better, and then we get to work together again until some idiot (Fury) splits us up again. Come on, we’ve got it down to a routine by now.” 

It looked like Natasha wanted to roll her eyes, but then she winced in pain. “Idiot. Well, next time it’s your turn to get hurt. And I’ll be the one scared about an idiot.” Clint squeezed her hand in his, “I will be an idiot, when I inevitably get hurt next time. You, are NOT an idiot. You just made a mistake, it happens.” Apparently Natasha didn’t have a reply for that. Or maybe she was too tired to talk.

A comfortable silence stretched out between them, as they enjoyed each other’s company. “How are you feeling?” Clint finally asked. Natasha paused before she answered, picking her words with care. “I’m tired. My neck’s sore. Head hurts, hurts a lot. Feel like I was in an explosion.” She closed her eyes when she said this, and it was selfish, but Clint wished she would open them again. 

He gently rubbed her forehead with one hand, hoping to help her feel better, she sighed, and relaxed under his touch. “Mmmm, that feels better…….” Clint kept stroking her head. “Are you sure you don’t want some medicine? I know the Dr’s are right outside the door, I’m sure they could give you something that would help.” 

Her eyes slowly opened, she stared at him again. “No….. No more drugs. No more than I need. I’m fine. Just…. stay with me? Please?” 

Clint smiled, and for some stupid reason, again resisted the urge to kiss her. “Of course I will.”

A half hour later a Dr. would come in to find Natasha was sleeping. And leaning over the bed, still sitting in his chair leaning forward uncomfortably, Clint was sleeping too, soundly for the first time in days. Finally able to rest with no nightmares, or guilt, still holding Natasha’s hand.  
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IS THE STORY OVER?????? WILL NATASHA BE OK????? I DON’T KNOW!!!!! I have a few ideas of what could happen next, but need REVIEWS!!!!! Please, let me know what you think, and let me know you are still sticking around for this story!!!!


	25. Chapter 25

Natasha was still laying in the hospital bed, and Clint still couldn’t get over how ridiculously happy he felt when he looked down, and was able to see her open, beautiful eyes staring back at him. 

The last day and a half….. They hadn’t been easy. A dizzying array of doctors, and scientists, and geniuses and nurses had been filtering in and out of the room almost non stop. Running tests, asking questions, giving good news and bad news, always reminding Clint that nothing was certain yet. Most all of them explained they could only guess if Natasha was going to make a full recovery, or stay stuck in this strange stage she was in for the rest of her life. 

Because although Natasha had made a huge leap forward by waking up, coming out from the other side of the coma lucid and mostly relatively alert, it seemed she was stuck now. On a kind of plato- Not moving forward, or noticeably improving, but thankfully not slipping back into her unresponsive vegetive state. 

Clint knew probably sooner than later, he would worry about things like the fact that she was having trouble speaking. That she stumbled over words, and had forgotten key memories from her life. But honestly right now, he was just so happy she was awake, and alive, that he couldn’t bring himself to worry about what the future might hold. Not yet. For now he was just grateful she was at his side.

Not that he didn’t have moments of worry, of fear. 

Like this morning, when Bruce had come to visit. He had wanted to see Natasha, of course, but had also asked Clint if he could come give her a check up. He had done more than his fair share of research on the brain in the past, and had suggested that he might be able to offer insight on Natasha’s condition, or discuss possible treatment plans with the many doctors taking care of her. 

So Banner had come in, his medical bag in hand, eager to help and relieved to hear Natasha was awake. She had been tired, but awake when he came in. And when Bruce came and stood next to her bed, smiling excitedly, relief clear on his face- Natasha had stared back at him. Her eyes empty of recognition, face clear of emotion. She stared at Bruce the same way she stared at every other Doctor who had come to examine her. For a second Clint told herself that she was just tired, or maybe it would take a minute for the face and memory to fit together. Then it hit him. 

Natasha didn’t know who Bruce was. She wasn’t even trying to think of who he was- She straight up didn’t know him. 

Still, at first Clint had hoped that she was just tired. Or messing with them, playing some kind of cruel twisted sick joke. Maybe she just needed to wake up a bit more, then she would realize who Bruce was.

But she didn’t react to him. Didn’t try and say his name, didn’t give him a second glance before her eyes gravitated back to Clint, didn’t look at him any differently than she had looked at anyone else who had come to examine her. 

The entire incident had made Clint feel sick to his stomach. 

Banner had handled it surprisingly well, taken it in stride. Obviously it had shaken him, to have Natasha not even consider that she might know who he was, but he hadn’t let her know that. He had asked Natasha if she recognized him, thought she might know him, and when he saw that his questions were upsetting her, Bruce had stopped asking them and done a few exams, talking kindly and brightly the whole time abut little nothing things. 

When he was done, Bruce had asked Clint if he could come out in the hall for a couple of minutes. Natasha had held tighter to Clint’s hand when he stood up to leave, her eyes glued to his face, and the archer had smiled and squeezed her hand before letting go. “Nat, it’s ok. I’ll be back in just a minute. I promise.” 

He could feel her eyes following him as he walked out of the room. 

Once he got into the hallway, Clint’s face had collapsed and he had leaned his head against the wall, not sure what else to do. Banner had stood awkwardly next to him, fidgeting with his hands, and the bag he was holding, not quite sure what to say. 

“Has….. Has that, happened with anyone else? I mean- Who else, has she seen? Am I the only one she didn’t recognize?”

Clint didn’t look up when he answered. “Rogers came to see her, but she was sleeping. He’s coming around later tonight. Um, there’s also- There was this Doctor, that came to check on her? Crazy guy, he’s super abrupt and somehow always gets stuck looking after me and Nat when we get hurt and need fixing up that we can’t do ourselves. Stitches, sutures, serious stuff. I didn’t think about it then, didn’t think it was a big deal, but she didn’t recognize him. Didn’t even react when she saw him. Is that bad? Maybe she was just tired, or didn’t care if she recognized him or not?”

Fear was gnawing at Clint’s insides. Where there more warning signs, red flags he had failed to notice? What else was wrong with his partner?

Bruce shrugged slowly, Clint thought he looked like a turtle trying to recede back into his shell. “Well, she’s only been awake for a little bit. Her brain has been through a lot, I wouldn’t worry about it yet…. Let me run some tests back in the lab, calculate a few things, and talk to her other doctors. I’ll let you know if there’s anything else you should be worried about. And start thinking of ways I can help. In the meantime keep an eye on her like you’ve been doing, contact me if anything else like this happens. You know. If she can’t think of the right word for something, or does’t recognize a face she should know, or can’t remember an even you think should be stuck in her memory. I don’t think you should be testing her yet, setting her up to answer questions she’s just not ready for. Like I said, her brains been through a lot. It’s possible this was just a fluke, and in a couple days her brain will be reoriented, and she’ll be fine. She will be fine. You shouldn’t worry about this Clint.” 

Banner tried to smile at Clint because the archer was looking at him like he was his last hope, patted his shoulder awkwardly, and then went back to the lab to calculate and formulate and plan how to get Natasha back to her old self. 

Bruce had come to see Natasha hours ago, but Clint hadn’t stopped thinking about his visit since he left. Natasha was sleeping now, and Clint was holding tight to her hand, and playing with the tangles of her hair, wondering if maybe he should try and brush some of the knots out of it. 

He was also looking at her closed eyes, wondering what was hiding behind them, brewing in her brain. Was she going to be ok? Did she really not remember who Bruce was? Would she remember him again, hopefully soon? What else couldn’t she remember? What would she never remember again? She’d hardly been able to move her right hand at all since she woke up, what else was she not going to be able to do?

It didn’t matter. Clint didn’t care if Natasha was bed bound for the rest of her life, or if she forgot his name tomorrow. He loved her, he would always be there for her. He was just scared of how Natasha Romanoff, The Black Widow could handle going from being a woman who could do almost everything, to doing, knowing, nothing. Having to start from the beginning. Again. How many times can a single person make over their entire life, from scratch? 

No, Clint didn’t want to think like that now. She was awake, talking just a little bit more every hour. She would be ok. She would remember everything, regain control over her entire body.

And if she wasn’t fine? He would take care of her. And if she had to start over from the beginning with nothing? Well, it wouldn’t be the first time she had to do that. And besides, she wouldn’t have nothing this time. She would have him.   
>

Steve was standing nervously in the hallway, waiting for Clint, or a Doctor, or someone to tell him he could come in to finally see Natasha. Suddenly the door opened, and Clint came out. He looked happier than he had been when Natasha was still unresponsive, but no longer looked quite as joyful as he had been in the immediate time after his partner woke up. 

Steve smiled nervously, “How is she?” Clint shrugged, shifted nervously from one foot to the other, he had been sitting still all day, he was used to being more active than this. “Um- Well, she’s- Still awake. And talking a bit more, and she can, you know, squeeze my hand and stuff.” 

Steve’s smile grew, but he hesitated before he spoke. “Um, so- isn’t that good? Shouldn’t you be happy about that?” Clint paused for a long moment before sighing.

“Steve….. Banner came by earlier. He wanted to visit, and check out Nat, see if he could do something to help. And- she didn’t recognize him, didn’t remember him, he could have been any of the other doctors who came to check on her. The doctors say there is a chance that her brain- just hasn’t rebooted yet, maybe she’ll wake up tomorrow and remember everything. But they don’t know the extent of the damage, they ran a lot of stupid tests today, and are probably going to run more tomorrow. I’ve been trying to talk to her about the mission, what went down in there. And when I asked her if she remembered if you made it out ok, she said she couldn’t remember. Steve, I know you want to go in and see her, but- there’s a chance that she won’t remember you.”

Steve processed this information, his face a mask that Clint couldn’t see behind. He had no idea what the captain was thinking. Then Steve reached out and patted Clint’s shoulder awkwardly and quickly. “I’m sorry Clint. I mean- At least she’s awake, right? That’s all that matters. She’s alive, and here, and everything is going to be ok.” 

That wasn’t exactly something Steve was 100% sure about, but it just felt like the right thing to say- and it seemed to comfort the archer. Clint half smiled. “You’re right- You ready to see her?” Steve nodded, and Clint opened the door to let him in. 

Steve was terrified. He had been through this before- Going to see someone he cared about, not being sure if that person would remember him. Of course Peggy came to mind. Every time he went to see her, he wasn’t sure if she would be lucid, know who he was and be able to hold a conversation, or if she would be totally out of it and have no recollection of Steve.

So at least it wasn’t like he wasn’t used to situations like this. He was still scared though. Because this time, if Natasha didn’t recognize him, it was going to be at least partially his own fault. 

Her eyes were closed when they got to her bedside, and at first Steve was worried she was asleep, but Clint somehow knew that she wasn’t. He reached out and lightly squeezed her hand. “Hey, Nat, someone’s here to see you.” Her eyes opened slowly, and at first just focused on Clint, she was looking at him, and her eyes were filled with trust, maybe even love. What would be in her eyes when she looked at Steve? Indifference? Non recognition? Confusion? Fear? Hate? 

Eventually she tore her gaze away from Clint, and when her eyes landed on Steve, she didn’t do anything at all for a few excruciating seconds. But then, she smiled. 

“Captain Rogers. You’re alive.” Steve was flooded with relief, there was a burning sensation at the back of his eyes for just a second, and he had to sit down in the chair next to Clint. He laughed a little bit, and tried to smile and look like he hadn’t thought he would never speak to her again. “Yeah, I’m alive Natasha. We’re both alive.” 

Her gaze was locked on his face, and when she spoke it was slowly, like she was fumbling for the right words, couldn’t quite figure out what to say. “I’m sorry, about your friend.” For a minute Steve was confused, then scared that she was really messed up and had no idea what she was talking about. Then she spoke again. “I’m sorry he’s gone-Bucky. The Winter Soldier. I- I’m sorry, that, you had to be the one- to shoot him. That’s not right.” 

Steve didn’t bother to tell her that in the end Bucky had killed himself, had set off the explosion that had almost killed her. That wasn’t the point, and might just confuse her more. Clint shot Steve a curious look, he hadn’t heard all of the details of their mission. He had been too worried about Nat to really care. Steve would explain the whole awful mess to him later, it didn’t matter now. 

“It’s fine Natasha. I had to, I mean, he was hurting people. The Bucky I know died years ago. I didn’t shoot him, I shot the Winter Soldier.” Steve had been trying to convince himself of this in the last week when he wasn’t worrying about Nat, or rescuing Clint. It wasn’t working, and he knew later would come guilt and grief and "what ifs" and "should have’s.” But honestly he had been so scared for Natasha, so guilty about her, he had hardly had time to think about Bucky. Hadn’t had time to mourn the loss of another friend. That would come later.

Natasha looked like she knew Steve didn’t really believe what he was saying, but she let it go. Maybe she wanted to believe him, maybe she was just tired. She squeezed on Clint’s hand in hers, and closed her eyes. For a second Steve was worried she was falling asleep, but he had things he had to say. 

“Natasha?” Her eyes didn’t open, but she raised one of her eyebrows and made a sound in her throat, to indicate she was listening. Steve’s eyes darted to Clint, wondering if he should say this in front of him or not but whatever, it didn’t matter. 

“I’m sorry if I let you down in the mission. I don’t know what I could have done differently, what I should have done differently, but I feel I should have prevented all- THIS from happening. I’m sorry that you’re in this hospital bed, I’m sorry I couldn’t protect you. And thank you for waking up from that damn coma, because if you hadn’t-“ Steve stopped talking, feeling emotional, not sure if he was supposed to reveal how much danger Natasha had been in. Maybe they didn’t want to upset her, and no one had told her they didn’t think she would wake up. 

Natasha’s eyes were open now, and it looked like she was trying to sit up but Clint sat up in his chair and gently pushed her back down to relax on the bed. “Nat. You heard the Doctors, you need to stay still.” She looked seriously annoyed, shot Clint a disgusted look but lay back down willingly enough. 

She was staring at Steve, and there wasn’t anything unfamiliar, or confused, tired or hazy in her eyes now, like there had been before. Her eyes looked stubborn, and determined, like she had to do something and was going to do it. When she spoke, she sounded just like the Natasha that Steve had learned to work with in the last couple months. 

“Steve. Nothing, and I mean nothing that happened on that mission was your fault. Do you understand that? Not Bucky dying, not me getting hurt, not the explosion, non of it was your fault.” Steve started to protest, and Natasha’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “Steve. Trust me. If it was your fault, I would tell you. I don’t lie to people I trust. None of this happened because of you. Ok? Do you believe me?” It looked like she was about to try and sit up again, but Clint was gently urging her to lay still.

And Steve didn’t believe her. Not really. But he soaked up her words, and tucked them away, hoping that someday he would pull them out again when he wasn’t so full of guilt. And maybe then he could trull appreciate them, and hopefully, some day, believe them. And maybe then this guilt over the mistakes of this last mission would go away. 

Now, though he really didn’t mean it, Steve smiled and said “Yeah, I believe you Natasha.” And she stared at him, for a long unblinking moment. Then she sighed, and relaxed back into her pillow. “You’re a terrible liar Rogers.” 

Steve couldn’t help but laugh at this, and shot back at her, “Well maybe I’m not in the right business then.” Natasha smiled, and Clint looked a bit confused, but he was smiling because Natasha was, and that alone was enough to make him happy. 

They talked a bit more, not about anything all that important. And then Natasha was having trouble keeping her eyes open, and Steve took that as his cue to leave. He was halfway to the door when she called his name. “Steve?” He paused, and looked back at her. He swore she was smirking at him. “Didn’t I tell you to ask Hill out a while ago?” Steve thought back to a mission when they first became partners, when they were on a boring stake out mission. Natasha had been throwing names of girls at him, adamant she would find him a date. And- yeah- She had suggested he ask Hill out. Steve nodded sheepishly, not able to help the smile on his face. “Um, yeah I think you did.” 

Natasha was definitely smirking as she looked at Clint. “You owe me twenty bucks, I told you I’d set him up with a girl before the end of the year.”

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	26. Chapter 26

Tony was standing in the hallway, and snorted as he rolled his eyes. “You seriously think ANYONE wouldn’t remember me bird brain? You think someone who hated me as much as Natasha has, would just forget about me? Come on, you must be delusional from lack of sleep. Seriously, take a nap dude.” Clint had to bite his tongue for a minute so he wouldn’t start yelling at the genius. He WAS tired, and though he hadn’t even been here a minute, Stark was already getting on his nerves. 

“It doesn’t matter if she knew you before or not, she can’t control it. She’s just having problems with remembering a few things- it’s complicated. I’m just waring you, so that you won’t freak out if you go in there and she has no clue who you are.” It looked like Tony was processing this information, then he asked an actual serious question. “Does she know that she’s, you know, forgetting stuff?” 

Clint shook his head. “No, and since Nat’s only been lucid for, what, two days? The Doctors don’t want to tell her yet, they worry it might upset her. They’re going to tell her and start running more psychological tests in a few days. For now they just want her to rest. So don’t bring it up, ok? And if she doesn’t remember you- Just say that you’re one of the higher ups in Shield, and wanted to come check on her.” 

Tony smirked, “What? I thought I WAS one of the higher ups in Shield, you don’t know what you’re talking about. You seriously need some sleep.” Stark sounded smug and confident, but looking at his face Clint saw the other man was worried. Iron Man and the Black Widow were not exactly friends- but they had been through a lot together. There was a connection there. A confusing, strange sometimes hateful connection, but still, it was a connection. It had to be unnerving to be about to see a friend, and not be sure if they would know you or not. Clint lightly punched Tony in the shoulder 

“Come on, you probably don’t have anything to worry about anyway. You’re too much of an asshole for her to forget about. In two minutes you guys are going to be arguing, and you’ll wish she didn’t remember your name.” Tony smiled at this, then paused. 

“She still doesn’t remember Banner?” Clint closed his eyes, and shook his head. “No, he came by again a couple hours ago. I think she’s starting to wonder why this “stranger” keeps checking up on her.” Barton chuckled without humor. “I’m trying not to worry about it- everyone’s telling me NOT to worry about it. There’s still a chance that her brain just has to reboot, she might remember everything again soon……” Tony stared at Clint for a second too long, worry rising up in his gut. “Everything? What else isn’t she remembering besides our green friend?” 

The archer’s shoulders slumped. “Um, it’s just- things she should know. Like she won’t be able to remember the right word for something, or it will take her longer than it should to figure out what I’m talking about. She slips in and out, sometimes she seems totally fine, like when Steve came, then five minutes later she can’t remember the right word for water.” For a second Clint looked haunted, and then he shook his head. “Not that any of that matters, she’s here, she’s alive, that’s all I care about.” 

Tony nodded. “Of course. What about the rest of her injuries? Maybe there’s something I could help with?” Clint found himself smirking. “What, are you going to make her an Iron Widow suit or something?” Tony shrugged, “If it would help her out, yeah!” Clint paused for a moment. “She’s having problems moving her left arm, her hand and stuff. And- well- we don’t know how well she’ll be able to walk yet. She has feeling in her legs, so that’s a heat sign, but it will be a while before she can even try walking. Before that we need to make sure the fracture in her spin has totally healed.” Tony nodded, processing this. “Ok, sounds like I might be able to make a few fun little toys that could help her out. Can I see her now?”

Natasha was awake when they entered, still forced to lay motionless, still looking as if she had just come back from the dead. But Clint had brushed the tangles out of her hair, and her eyes were open. So she looked a lot better than a week ago, when she was still in a coma and everyone thought she was pretty much dead. 

Her eyes locked onto Clint as soon as he entered the room, like they always did now whenever he had been away from her, even if just for a few minutes and came back. Then they shifted reluctantly off of him, and moved to Tony. 

For a second no one knew what she was thinking, maybe she didn’t even know- her eyes were blank, Clint got the impression that her brains as fumbling for the right answer, correct thing to say. 

Then Tony walked up to the side of her bed, and grinning smugly said, “Miss Rushman is it? Aren’t you looking ravishing as always.” It looked like Natasha wanted to roll her eyes, but didn’t. She’d told Clint earlier it hurt to move her eyes around too much. “Shut up Stark, I’m confused enough without you bringing up my aliases.”

Tony took a step back, and placed a hand over his chest in mock shock. “Wait, what? That was an alias? You LIED to me? I’m wounded Natalie- Oops, sorry, you’re Natasha now. I’m hurt, thought we had a connection. I mean I flew across the world to rescue your boyfriends sorry ass so he could be at your side when you woke up! You need to stop lying to me babe, or I’ll stop doing nice stuff like that for you.” 

Natasha was actually smirking now, and slowly spoke. “Do not call me babe, or I will get out of this bed and cut off any appendages I decide you don’t need any more.” Clint burst out laughing at this, Tony just grimaced. “See, you’re just getting defensive because I hit a nerve calling bird brain your boyfriend.”

She sighed, “No, I just don’t like being called babe.” 

Tony’s eyes darted to the medical equipment around her bed, taking in the charts, the information, the way Natasha had to search for each word before saying it. “So, how you feeling Spidey? Are you basically ready to go out on missions again soon, because let me tell you working with the Avengers isn’t quite the same without you. We really need a woman’s touch.” 

“i’m fine, I’ve had worse. Like that time when I was in that car crash in- Um…..” Her eyes darted towards Clint, he started supplying the names of places she’d been in car accidents trying to help her. “Rome? Tokyo? Taiwan? Dubai? London? Budapest?” Natasha shook her head, looking annoyed and vaguely panicked when she couldn’t remember. “No, Clint, the one where we were undercover and you found me in the hospital?” Clint frowned, “NYC? Mexico? Paris? Wait, you mean the job in Brazil where we got split up, and you dislocated your leg?” 

Natasha barly nodded. Clint grinned. “Oh, yeah that was bad, at least as awful as this. And you recovered from that, you’ll be fine before we know it Nat.” Tony was staring at the two of them with a vague sense of horror. “Oh my gosh, what is wrong with you two?!?! Is there anywhere you HAVEN”T been on the edge of death?” Clint rolled his eyes. “It’s a perk of the job Tony, being able to say you’ve almost died on ever continent.”

Stark looked reasonably impressed by this, and more than a little freaked out. “Well that’s- horrible…..” He wanted to ask more questions (how many time had they almost died and on how many continents? Was this like a weekly thing for them? Had they ever almost killed each other? How did they almost die in Antarctica? Had they almost frozen to death? They’d probably almost frozen to death.) But Natasha was looking uneasy, and with her memory going all crazy Tony decided that maybe asking a load of questions might not be the best thing for her right now. It didn’t stop him from talking though. 

“So, Red, sorry I don’t have any gifts for you. I kind of went overboard bringing you stuff when you were still knocked out. I’m kind of forbidden from bringing anything else on board any3 Shield aircraft until further notice…. I mean, I still would have gone out on a flight to buy you a “congrats on waking up from your coma” gift, but your boyfriend only told me I could visit like ten minutes ago. Didn’t give me much of a warning.”

“Don’t call him my boyfriend.” Natasha muttered, her eyes were closed again. Then she didn’t say anything else, and Stark stood their awkwardly for a minute or two, not sure what to say. “Well…… This has been fun, um, glad you woke up Romanoff. Really. Would have missed you if anything had- happened.” He thought she wasn’t listening when he spoke, but she smiled at his words and her eyes opened again. 

“Sweet, Stark. You have quite a way with words. It’s nice to know I’d be missed” Her eyes darted clumsily to Clint, then moved back to Tony. “Hey, I owe you one. Thanks for getting Clint for me.” She half smiled at him, and Tony just rolled his eyes. “Yeah, of course you do. Just get out of that bed so you can get back on the team, Birdbrain is insufferable to work with if you aren’t around to handle him.” 

She scoffed. “Come on, give me a break Stark, he’s your problem for now, you handle him.” Her words might have sounded harsh, or like some dumb joke, but Tony noticed the way her grip tightened around the archers hand. He snorted. “Yeah, whatever Spidey. I’m going to go now, see if I can rig up something to help you with that arm of yours, and I’ll see you next time mother hen let’s me in for a visit.” 

Natasha didn’t reply to this, neither did Clint. She was too tired and he was too absorbed in her to notice when Stark left to work in his lab.   
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Ok, not sure if I should have a Thor chapter in here or not, would you guys even want that? Yes? No? I am going to be taking a little break on this story, BUT STILL WRITING IT because the next few chapters are going to need to be posted in rapid succession, for the best emotional affect ;) Uh oh, you scared now about where this story MIGHT go? Bwahahahaha ;D Please review


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